COLLEGE  SE 


'<i!n. 


iv^-'-^    1  1950 


# 


BX    9178     .A33X 

Albertson,  Charles  Carroll, 
1865-1959. 


n^^'\^^^     ^^.^««^.^« 


khh    1  1950 


COLLEGE 
SERMONS 

CHARLES  CARROLL  ALBERTSON 

MINISTER   CENTRAL,   PRESBYTERIAN    CHURCH 
ROCHESTER,    NEW   YORK 


i^^'/CAL 


PHILADELPHIA 

THE  WESTMINSTER  PRESS 

1909 


Sl^t 


Published,  December,  1909 
Copyright,  1909,  by 

THK  TRUSTEES  OF  THE  PRESBYTERIAN  BOARD  OF   PUBLICATION 
AND  SABBATH   SCHOOL  WORK 


CONTENTS 


CHAP. 


PAGE 

I.  The  Supremacy  of  the  Unseen    ....       i) 

II.     The  Call  to  the  Heights 21 

III.  The  Great  Appeal ^3 

IV.  Man's  Response  to  Christ's  Appeal  ...     45 
V.     A  Doubter's   Prayer 55 

VI.  The  Intellectual  Influence  of  Jesus   .      .     65 

VII.  The  Inspiration  of  the  Prophet    ....     75 

VIII.     Christian    Certainties .89 

IX.    My  Witnesses 101 

X.    Life's    Great    Meaning 113 

XI.  The  Enlargement  of  Life   .     ,,     .     .     .      •   123 

XII.     The   Saving   Few 135 

XIII.  Success  and  Failure 147 

XIV.  Not  by  Bread.  Alone 161 

XV.  The  Practical  Value  of  Sentiment   .      .      .173 

XVI.    The  Athenian  Altar 185 


AUTHOR'S  NOTE 

No  part  of  the  author's  ministry  has  been  more 
pleasurable  than  the  frequent  opportunity  to  ad- 
dress the  students  of  various  colleges  and  universi- 
ties. The  sermons  included  in  this  book  have  been 
preached  in  recent  years  at  Cornell  University,  the 
University  of  Pennsylvania,  the  Woman's  College 
of  Baltimore,  Princeton  University,  Syracuse  Uni- 
versity, and  Vassar  College.  Two  of  the  briefer 
sermons  were  delivered  at  the  afternoon  service  at 
Cornell,  at  which  the  speaker  is  limited  to  fifteen 
minutes.  Two  of  the  sermons  were  preached  on  the 
Day  of  Prayer  for  Colleges,  and  one  on  the  evening 
of  Commencement  Day,  before  the  college  Chris- 
tian Association.  ^    _,    . 

C.  C.  A. 


THE  SUPEEMACY  OF  THE  UNSEEN 


"When  in  the  secret  place  of  our  soul  we  build  our  God, 
we  form  Him  not  out  of  cosmic  forces,  not  out  of  gravitation 
and  chemical  attraction,  but  out  of  holiness  and  love.  And, 
lo !  as  we  look,  the  form  is  as  of  the  Son  of  Man !  The 
Absolute  as  Absolute  is  not  enough  for  the  religious  life. 
Man  must  have  some  fixed,  visible  point,  some  crystalliza- 
tion, as  it  were,  of  the  All  on  which  his  love  and  reverence 
may  rest.  That  is  where  the  New  Testament  story  meets 
him.  Here  he  finds  the  humanizing  and  personalizing  of  the 
Infinite  Goodness.  In  the  study  of  this  Life  he  tastes  eter- 
nity. And  as  he  believes,  the  power  to  be  good  flows  into 
him.  Therefore  knows  he  to-day  the  Christ,  not  only  as 
human,  but  also  as  Divine;  not  only  as  a  figure  in  history, 
but  as  the  eternal  Now. 

"  'God  may  have   other  Words   for  other  worlds, 

But    for    this    world    the    Word    of    God    is    Christ.' " 

iOursehes   and   the    Universe.    J.    Brierly.     pp.    300,    301.) 


COLLEGE    SERMONS  ' 


THE   SUPREMACY   OF   THE    UNSEEN 

■'We  look  not  at  the  things  which  are  seen,  but  at  the 
things  which  are  not  seen."     II.  Cor.  iv.  18. 

It  is  difficult  for  us  to  determine  the  dominant 
moral  quality  of  our  own  age.  We  are  too  near  it 
— too  much  a  part  of  it.  We  are  like  soldiers  in 
a  battle.  We  know  a  little  of  the  topography  of 
the  ground  over  which  we  fight,  advancing  or  re- 
treating, but  of  the  great  plan  of  the  battle,  and 
of  the  greater  campaign,  of  which  the  battle  is  a 
part,  we  know  nothing  until  the  campaign  is  ended, 
and  becomes  a  matter  of  history. 

It  takes  time  to  read  history  aright.  One  says, 
**This  is  an  age  of  sin,"  and  another,  *'An  age  of 
doubt."  Probably  it  is  both.  One  of  our  most 
brilliant  essayists  says,  **  Commercially  it  is  an  age 
of  advertisement;  socially,  it  is  an  age  of.publico- 
mania;  physically,  it  is  an  age  of  nerves;  politi- 
cally, it  is  an  age  of  democracy."  Another  says, 
*'It  is  an  age  of  speed — its  motto  is  'Accelerate!'  " 
But  do  we  not  include  it  all  when  we  say,  *'It  is 
an  age  of  devotion  to  the  material ' '  ? 

9 


10  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

What  are  our  favorite  mottoes  ?  * '  One  world  at 
a  tirae  is  enough."  We  have  to  thank  agnosticism 
for  that.  ''Seeing  is  believing."  Whom  have  we 
to  thank  for  that  ?  Oh,  we  all  say  that.  It  has  be- 
come a  proverb,  that  is,  a  proved  truth !  And  yet, 
calling  it  so  does  not  make  it  so.  It  may  be  a 
sophism,  a  thing  that  appears  true,  but  is  not,  a 
falsehood  masquerading  as  truth. 

President  Hadley  of  Yale  said  a  year  ago, 
' '  There  are  but  three  ideals  of  life  for  us  to  choose 
from — the  Stoic,  the  Epicurean,  and  the  Chris- 
tian." Two  of  these,  the  Stoic  and  the  Epicurean, 
agree  that  one  world  at  a  time  is  enough,  affirm 
that  seeing  is  believing.  Christianity  alone  chal- 
lenges these  sayings.  Christianity  says,  ''One 
world  at  a  time  is  not  enough — to  say  that  it  is,  and 
-to  act  as  if  it  were,  is  'planetary  provincialism.'  " 
Christianity  says,  "Seeing  is  not  believing.  Be- 
lieving is  seeing."  And  nowhere  does  it  say  so 
more  plainly  than  in  this  text — "We  look  .  .  . 
at  the  things  which  are  not  seen. ' ' 

It  is  a  sad  thing  to  be  blind,  never  to  see  a  flower 
or  star,  never  to  see  the  liquid  emerald  of  the  ocean 
or  the  gleaming  sapphire  of  the  setting  sun ;  never 
to  see  one 's  own  sweet  mother 's  face !  The  deaf 
are  unfortunate,  never  to  hear  the  sound  of  wind 
among  the  pines,  or  of  mountain  streams  falling 
over  rocks,  or  the  music  of  harp  or  viol  or  organ, 
or  the  sweeter  music  of  the  human  voice!  Pity 
those  who  are  doomed  to  live  in  a  world  of  total 
darkness  or  of  silence!  But  more  to  be  pitied  are 
those  who, ' '  have  eyes  to  see,  and  see  not, ' '  and  who 


THE   SUPKEMACY    OF   THE   UNSEEN  11 

' '  have  ears  to  hear,  and  hear  not. '  *  Multitudes  of 
people,  not  at  all  deficient  in  physical  faculties,  pass 
through  the  world  blind  to  its  beauty  and  deaf  to 
its  harmony.  A  woman  once  said  to  Mr.  Turner, 
who  could  put  an  almost  infinite  expanse  of  sky  into 
a  square  foot  of  canvas,  *'I  never  saw  a  sky  like 
that ! ' '  And  he  replied,  * '  I  suppose  not,  but  don 't 
you  wish  you  could?" 

Much  knowledge  as  we  gain  through  our  senses, 
there  is  a  vast  universe  of  reality  which  no  physi- 
cal sense  can  comprehend.  After  we  have  seen 
everything  visible,  heard  everything  audible, 
touched  everything  tangible,  weighed  everything 
ponderable,  experienced  everything  possible  by 
means  of  nerves  optic,  auditory,  olfactory,  gusta- 
tory, sensory, — that  is  not  all.  Knowledge  is  not  so 
limited  as  that.  That  would  be  a  small  world  to 
live  in.  By  far  the  largest  part  of  our  universe  is 
beyond  the  range  of  sensuous  apprehension. 

Confronting  the  man  whose  creed  is  ''Seeing 
is  believing"  is  a  man  whose  creed  is  "Believing 
is  seeing."  He  is'  Paul.  He  believes  in  the  in- 
visible. He  labors  for  invisible  results.  He  prays 
to  an  invisible  God.  He  endures  as  seeing  an 
invisible  Saviour.  He  feeds  on  invisible  manna. 
He  has  meat  to  eat  that  men  know  not  of.  And 
by  his  side  there  stands  an  innumerable  company 
of  others.  Here  is  Tennyson,  singing,  in  "In 
Memoriam : ' ' 

Strong  Son  of  God,  immortal  Love, 
Whom  we,  that  have  not  seen  Thy  face, 
By  faith,  and  faith  alone,  embrace. 


12  COLLEGE    SERMONS 

Here  is  BrowTiing,  triumphant,  in  ''Paracel- 
sus:" 

•  I  see  my  way  as  birds  their  trackless  way, — 
I  shall  arrive ! 

And  here  we  stand  this  morning,  repeating  the 
Christian  creed,  *'We  look  not  at  the  things  which 
are  seen,  but  at  the  things  which  are  not  seen." 

That  we  may  be  certain  of  the  reality  of  the  un- 
seen, and  that  we  may  have  wherewith  to  answer 
those  who  boast  of  being  sure  of  things  material, 
let  us  be  reminded  of  some  forces  with  which 
we  deal  daily,  not  included  in  the  catalogue  of  the 
visible. 

First,  consider  how  many  of  the  purely  phys- 
ical forces  of  the  universe  are  invisible, — gravity, 
electricity,  chemical  affinity,  atmospheric  pressure, 
and  the  like.  We  talk  of  the  attraction  of  gravita- 
tion, and  we  know  that  it  operates  everywhere,  but 
the  force  itself  is  so  elusive  that  it  was  only  a  little 
while  ago  we  discovered  the  law  by  which  we  meas- 
ure it.  We  are  familiar  with  the  application  of 
electricity  to  commerce  and  industry,  but  we  know 
little  of  its  nature.  We  have  never  seen  it.  We 
have  seen  a  fiery  finger  thrust  through  a  storm 
cloud,  shattering  an  oak,  or  destroying  a  life  as 
with  the  touch  of  an  avenging  angel ;  we  have  seen 
motion  impelled  by  the  force,  but  the  force  itself, 
like  the  glory  of  God,  no  man  can  look  upon  it 
and  live.  The  most  gifted  electrical  scientist  of 
our  day,  was  asked  at  a  dinner,  "What  is  electric- 


THE    SUPKEMACY   OF   THE   UNSEEN  13 

ity  ? "    And  he  replied,  * '  It  is  a  force  about  which  J  / 
we  know  absolutely  nothing." 

You  can  take  two  harmless  substances,  an  acid 
and  an  oil,  and  produce  a  high  explosive.     What 
invincible   energy   was   at  work   combining  those 
atoms  into  a  substance  so  different  from  either  of  i 
its  constituents?     We  call  it  chemical  affinity. 

The  weight  of  the  atmosphere  upon  this  building 
is  far  greater  than  the  weight  of  the  building 
itself.  But  what  is  the  atmosphere?  What  are 
those  ether  waves  on  which  we  send  our  wireless 
messages?  The  President  of  the  British  Society 
for  the  Advancement  of  Science  once  said,  ''Ether 
is  the  nominative  case  of  the  verb  undulate.*' 
How  very  plain  that  makes  it ! 

Now  what  is  it  that  discovers  these  cosmic  forces 
and  employs  them?  It  is  evident  there  is  some- 
thing superior  to  gravity  and  electricity,  for  it 
takes  gravity  and  electricity  and  harnesses  them. 
We  call  it  thought.  But  what  is  thought?  It, 
too,  forbids  analysis.  We  can  analyze  the  brain, 
but  there  is  no  trace  of  thought  there.  There  are 
cells  of  living  tissue  there,  each  cell  composed  of 
three  parts.  The  heart  of  the  cell  is  composed  of 
nutrient  matter;  this  turns  to  formed  matter,  and 
formed  matter  changes  to  dead  matter,  and  this  is 
the  vital  process.  But  tissue  from  the  brain  of  a 
frog  reveals  the  same  process.  There  is  (to  use  the 
figure  of  Joseph  Cook)  a  little  invisible  weaver 
at  work  in  each  cell,  weaving  the  wonderful  fabric 
of  life,  but  what  it  is  in  the  human  brain  that 
thinks — what  it  is  in  human  life  that  writes  poems, 


14  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

and  carves  statues,  and  paints  pictures,  and  com- 
poses orations,  and  strikes  off  constitutions,  and 
♦  plans  the  conquest  of  the  earth  and  air — what  it 
is  that  flashes  intelligence  under  the  sea,  and  over 
the  continent,  that  tames  the  winds  and  waves, 
and  nestles  the  lightning  in  its  palm,— ^who  knows? 
But  that  it  is  royal,  creative,  only  a  little  short 
of  omnipotent,  who  does  not  know? 

We  started  with  physical  forces,  impersonal,  un- 
conscious, blind,  reasonless,  but  mighty.  And  we 
found  something  superior  to  these.  Is  there  any- 
thing superior  to  thought? 

There  is.  And  we  call  it  love.  It  is  as  much 
above  thought,  as  thought  is  above  gravity.  It 
is  to  the  soul  what  gravity  is  to  the  body.  And 
yet  it  is  so  mysterious  that  we  know  less  about  it 
than  we  do  of  gravity.  Sir  Isaac  Newton  discov- 
ered the  law  that  any  two  objects  in  the  universe 
attract  each  other  with  a  force  that  varies  accord- 
ing to  the  inverse  square  of  the  distance  that  sepa- 
rates them.  But  it  does  not  hold  true  that  any 
two  souls  in  the  universe  attract  each  other  with  a 
force  that  varies  according  to  the  inverse  square 
of  the  distance  that  separates  them ! 

But  think  of  what  love  can  do.  Men  live  for  it, 
suffer  for  it,  die  for  it.  How  absurd — to  live  and 
suffer  and  die,  inspired  by  an  unseen  power! 
Thought  conquers  steam  and  electricity,  but  love 
conquers  thought.  And  thought  becomes  its  hum- 
ble slave !  What  boundless  service,  what  uncalcu- 
lating  sacrifice,  what  absolute  effacement  of  itself, 
love  can  evoke! 


THE   SUPBEMACY   OF   THE   UNSEEN  15 

Cool,  calculating  reason  is  no  match  for  love. 
Love  laughs  at  reason  as  easily  as  at  locksmiths! 
Who  calls  love  unreal?  A  man  crosses  the  conti- 
nent to  sit  beside  his  gray-haired  mother,  and  say, 
**Talk  to  me  as  you  used  to  do — I  am  tired  and  I 
need  your  prayers.'*  A  mother  exiles  herself  to 
a  leper  island  to  be  the  companion  of  her  afflicted 
son.  A  family  of  Hungarian  immigrants,  a  father 
and  mother  and  six  children,  apply  for  admission 
to  America  at  Ellis  Island.  A  little  farm  in  Wis- 
consin awaits  them.  The  parents  pass  inspection, 
and  five  of  the  children,  but  one  daughter  is  men- 
tally deficient.  These  can  remain.  She  must  re- 
turn to  the  land  from  which  she  came.  And  she  re- 
turns— but  not  alone.  They  all  go  back.  Love  is 
stronger  than  hope — stronger  than  desire  for  land 
and  liberty !  When  we  remember  how  strong  love 
is,  we  are  not  surprised  that  an  Apostle  declares, 
**God  is  love.''  It  is  an  advance  force  of  the 
Kingdom  of  Heaven. 

But  there  is  something  stronger  than  love.  It 
is  conscience.  We-  say  the  brain  is  the  organ  of 
thought.  Sentimentally,  the  heart  is  the  seat  of 
love.  Where  is  the  throne  of  conscience?  And 
what  is  conscience?  All  we  know  is  that  it  is 
a  tremendous  reality,  invisible,  yet  superior  to  love 
because  it  directs  love  toward  worthy  objects.  He 
knew  what  conscience  is  who  wrote: 


*I  hear  a  voice  you  cannot  hear, 
Which  says  I  must  not  stay; 

I  see  a  hand  you  cannot  see, 
Which  beckons  me  away." 


16  COLLEGE    SERMONS 

An  invisible  hand,  yet  sceptering  multitudes. 
An  inaudible  voice,  yet  coming  up  from  inner 
depths  with  regal  authority.     Emerson  wrote; 

'  So  nigh  is  grandeur  to  our  dust, 
So  near  is  God  to  man. 
When  Duty  whispers  low,  Thou  must, 
\       The  youth  replies,   I  can. 
\ 

The  **I  must*'  of  duty  and  the  ''I  ought"  of 
conscience  are  the  same.  It  is  what  elevates  life 
from  the  moment  it  is  recognized  and  given  domin- 
ion. It  is  the  very  ground  of  righteousness,  the 
basis  of  character. 

Here  are  two  men.  One  died  peacefully  in  his 
home,  surrounded  by  an  affectionate  family,  honor- 
ing them,  and  honored  by  them.  His  loss  is  de- 
plored by  the  community.  The  world  is  poorer 
since  he  has  gone,  and  heaven  is  surer  and  nearer. 
The  other,  too,  is  dead,  but  how  and  where?  On 
the  public  highway,  a  bullet  through  his  heart,  a 
rifle  in  his  hand,  curses  on  his  lips — shot  down  like 
a  wild  beast,  in  his  flight  from  a  plundered  bank. 
Shot  down  as  he  should  have  been.  An  outlaw 
and  a  public  enemy. 

Now  what  is  the  difference  between  these  men? 
One  cherished  conscience,  kept  it  void  of  offense 
toward  God  and  man,  recognized  in  it  his  kinship 
to  the  Divine.  The  other  put  away  conscience, 
heard  but  did  not  heed  the  voice  of  stillness,  and 
died  as  he  lived,  a  bandit.  Strange,  is  it  not,  that 
such  a  difference  is  attributable  to  the  presence  in 
one,  and  the  absence  from  the  other,  of  an  entirely 
invisible  power? 


THE   SUPREMACY   OF   THE   UNSEEN  17 

We  have  ascended.  We  have  seen  the  forces  of 
nature  about  us,  and  have  found  something  in  the 
realm  of  mind  called  thought,  that  subdues  them. 
We  have  found  something  in  the  moral  realm 
called  love,  that  controls  thought,  and  something 
in  the  same  realm  that  governs  love.  At  last  we 
come  to  the  realm  of  the  spirit  and  find  a  force  as 
much  superior  to  conscience  as  conscience  is  supe- 
rior to  love,  or  love  to  thought,  or  thought  to  gravi- 
tation. Thought  masters  physical  energy.  Love 
commands  thought.  Conscience  conquers  love. 
And  faith  enlightens  and  vitalizes  conscience.  We 
have  reached  the  summit  of  the  pyramid.  We  are 
not  far  from  God.  We  are  in  the  presence  of 
God.  We  work  with  God  and  God  works  with 
us.  For  faith  takes  hold  on  God — touches  the 
healing  hem  of  His  garment.  Nothing  is  holier, 
nothing  higher,  nothing  mightier,  than  this. 
What  is  it?  The  Apostle  tells  us:  ''Faith  is  the 
substance  of  things  hoped  for,  the  evidence  of 
things  not  seen." 

Think  of  a  cyclone  plowing  a  furrow  of  death 
through  a  populous  city.  Think  of  an  earthquake, 
laying  low  a  province.  But  here  in  the  realm  of 
the  spirit  is  a  force  that  seizes  nations  and  perma- 
nently affects  the  civilization  of  the  world.  Paul 
invokes  it  and  Rome  turns  Christian.  Luther  in- 
vokes it,  and  Europe  is  lighted  up  with  reforma- 
tion fires.  Wesley  invokes  it,  and  England  is 
saved  from  a  reign  of  terror. 

This  force  enters  into  human  life  and  we  have  an 
Augustine,  a  John  Bunyan,  a  George  Whitefield,  a 


18  COLLEGE   SEBMONS 

Dwight  L.  Moody,  every  one  an  apostle  of  the  un- 
seen. 

But  music  is  unreal  to  the  deaf.  Color  is  unreal 
to  the  blind.  Faith  is  unreal  to  the  prayerless. 
But  to  those  who  pray  faith  is  a  substantial  verity. 
And  the  whole  end  and  aim  of  Christianity  is  to 
lead  us  to  live  less  in  the  realm  of  the  visible  and 
more  in  the.  realm  of  the  invisible.  Religion  is  the 
life  of  God  in  the  soul  of  man.  And  this  is  wis- 
dom, this  is  power,  this  is  peace, — to  see  God  as 
Jesus  Christ  reveals  Him — at  once  the  most  ex- 
tensive and  the  most  personal  fact  in  the  universe. 


II 

THE  CALL  TO  THE  HEIGHTS 


"It  may  be  that  the  world  can  get  along  without  God  but 
/  cannot.  The  universe-finity  is  to  me  like  the  chord  of  the 
dominant  seventh,  always  leading  towards,  always  inviting 
onwards,  a  chord  of  progress ;  God  is  the  tonic  triad,  a 
chord  of  repose." 

iPoem    Outlines.     Sidney    Lanier,     p.    69.) 

"Life,  for  every  one  of  us,  however  small  our  place,  is  a 
load  too  heavy  to  bear  alone,  too  heavy,  because  for  each  of 
us  it  is  weighted  with  death  and  eternity.  It  is  made  so 
that,  by  the  compulsion  of  our  weakness,  we  may  be  pressed 
into  alliance  with  a  power  that  is  not  our  own." 

{Sidelights   on   Religion.     J.    Brierly.     p.    253.) 


II 


THE  CALL   TO   THE   HEIGHTS 

*'0  thou  that  tellest  good  tidings  to  Zion,  get  thee  up  on 
a  high  mountain ;  O  thou  that  tellest  good  tidings  to  Jeru- 
salem, lift  up  thy  voice  with  strength ;  lift  it  up,  be  not 
afraid ;  say  unto  the  cities  of  Judah,  Behold  your  God  !'^ 
Isa.  xl  9.     (R.  V.) 

The  office  of  the  Hebrew  prophet  was  not  merely 
to  foretell,  but  to  forth-tell,  to  tell  forth  to  men  the 
will  of  God.  His  voice  was  sometimes  the  voice  of 
destiny,  telling  what  was  to  be  in  the  fullness  of 
time.  But  it  was  oftener  the  voice  of  duty,  tell- 
ing what  ought  to  be  now. 

Isaiah  is  first  among  Hebrew  prophets  in  the 
splendor  of  his  poetic  speech,  and  in  the  loftiness 
of  his  spirit.  Seven  hundred  years  before  the  Star 
of  Bethlehem  showered  its  silver  on  the  Judean 
night,  he  had  caught  the  gleam  of  the  day  it  her- 
alded, and  in  his  grasp  of  spiritual  truth  he  is  as 
one  who  has  already  seen  the  Christ.  He  saw 
from  afar  *'the  consolation  of  Israel''  and  his 
heart  was  glad.  That  is  the  secret  of  his  buoy- 
ancy. He  was  not  blind  to  the  social  and  political 
corruption  of  the  age.  No  man  saw  more  clearly 
than  he,  and  he  kept  not  silence.  But  he  saw  more. 
He  saw  **the  increasing  purpose''  of  God,  running 
through  the  ages,  and  the  thoughts  of  men  growing 

21 


22  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

wider  and  the  world  growing  readier  for  the  com- 
ing of  its  King.  There  is  your  true  optimist.  He 
is  not,  as  one  has  said,  *'one  who  does  not  care 
what  happens,  so  it  does  not  happen  to  him.''  He 
is  simply  one  who  sees  farther  than  his  fellows. 
He  hears  sounds  to  which  other  ears  are  deaf,  like 
the  little  Scotch  girl,  whose  senses  had  grown  keen 
in  long  illness,  who,  at  the  siege  of  Lucknow, 
heard  the  pipers  miles  away,  as  British  troops 
marched  to  the  rescue  of  the  city. 

It  is  wonderful  how  far  you  can  see  from  a 
mountain.  In  the  northern  part  of  the  Adiron- 
dacks  there  is  a  peak,  from  the  summit  of  which,  on 
a  clear  day,  one  can  see  not  alone  the  neighboring 
Adirondacks,  but  the  Green  Mountains  of  Vermont 
and  the  White  Mountains  of  New  Hampshire.  Yon- 
der narrow  strip  of  green  is  Lake  Champlain.  To 
the  west  is  a  silvery  ribbon — that  is  the  St.  Law^- 
rence,  dotted  with  a  thousand  islands,  while  yon- 
der,— north  and  east — are  the  spires  of  Montreal. 
On  such  a  mountain  stood  the  man  of  God  who 
looked  across  to  Canaan  ere  he  closed  the  long 
heroic  record  of  his  life.  To  the  watchman  on 
such  a  mountain,  a  dweller  in  the  valley  called  out, 
''What  of  the  night?"  and  got  the  answer,  ''The 
morning  cometh,  and  also  the  night."  To  the 
prophet,  in  the  city  or  in  the  temple  courts,  God's 
spirit  calls,  in  the  text,  saying,  "Get  thee  up  to  a 
high  mountain."  This  is  "the  call  to  the  heights." 
And  it  is  God's  call  to  every  human  soul. 

It  is  a  call  to  clear  vision.  How  easily  the  prob- 
lems of  the  present  blind  us  to  the  issues  of  the 


THE    CALL   TO   THE   HEIGHTS  23 

future!     When   the   Franco-Prussian   war   began,^ 
a  messenger  awakened  Von   Moltke   at  midnight  \ 
with  the  news  that  the  French  army  had  taken  the 
field  with  the  cry,  ''On  to  Berlin."     He  said,  ''My 
orders  are  in  the  desk,  in  the  pigeonhole  at  the 
right.     Please  see  that  they  are  issued."    And  he 
slept  on  until  morning.     His  plans  were  already 
made.     The  war  was  ended  before  it  began,  and, 
practically,  the  Germans  were  in  Paris  long  be-' 
fore  Sedan,  just  because  they  were  rich  in  men  of 
vision.     "Napoleon  the  Little"  was  also  "Napol- 
eon the  Blind." 

August  27,  1858,  Lincoln  and  Douglas  held  their 
second  joint  debate  at  Freeport.  At  a  conference 
of  Republican  leaders  the  night  before,  Lincoln  an- 
nounced his  intention  of  forcing  Douglas  on  the 
morrow  to  declare  himself  on  the  question  whether 
a  territorial  legislature  had  or  had  not  the  power  to 
exclude  slavery.  He  was  counseled  not  to  do  so, 
for  it  was  foreseen  that  Douglas  could  make  but 
one  answer,  and  that  his  position  would  make  him 
popular  in  Illinois,  and  win  for  him  the  senator- 
ship.  But  Lincoln  said,  "I  am  after  larger  game. 
The  battle  of  1860  is  worth  a  hundred  of  this." 
He  foresaw  that  the  very  declaration  which  would 
win  the  senatorship  for  Douglas  would  lose  him  the 
presidency,  and  it  did,  for  it  hopelessly  divided  the 
Democratic  party.  It  is  not  at  all  likely  that  Lin- 
coln expected  to  be  elected  president  in  two  years, 
but  he  expected  that  some  Republican  would  be 
elected  president  on  that  issue.  No  man  in  mod- 
ern  times   has  possessed  the   prophetic   spirit  in 


24  COLLEGE    SERMONS 

larger  measure  than  he.  Some  one  said  of  him 
during  the  war,  **  There  was  always  a  far-away 
look  in  his  eyes.'*  His  soul  was  far  away.  He 
was  a  watchman  on  the  mountain. 

If  we  look  for  such  a  man  beyond  the  sea,  we 
find  him  in  Gladstone,  of  whom  Bxmsen  said,  ' '  He 
has  heard  higher  tones  than  anyone  else  in  the 
land. ' '  By  which  he  meant  that  Gladstone 's  mind 
was  habitually  possessed  by  a  higher  consciousness 
than  that  of  others. 

The  best  thing  about  this  life  of  ours  is  that  it 
has  the  capacity  for  height.  By  one  path  or  an- 
other, by  poverty  or  by  pain,  by  discipline  of  the 
mind  or  of  the  soul,  by  study  of  the  works  or  the 
Word  of  God,  by  the  passion  for  service  or  the 
power  of  prayer,  or  by  all  of  these  combined,  we 
may  rise  until  the  earth  seems  but  a  little  thing, 
and  heaven  not  far  away.  Is  not  this  the  poet's 
meaning  ? 

"I  hold  it  truth,  with  him  who  sings 
To  one  clear  harp  of  divers  tones, 
That  men  may  rise  on  stepping-stones 
Of  their  dead  selves  to  higher  things." 

/  The  problem  of  life,  then,  above  all  else,  is  this; 
how  to  regulate  our  habits  of  thought  and  action, 
how  to  fulfill  the  duties  and  suffer  the  sorrows  of 
time,  so  that  by  these  we  may  attain  at  length  **the 
firm  resolve,  the  temperate  will,''  the  habit  of  see- 
ing things  from  the  highest  possible  view-point. 
It  is  a  great  thing  to  stand  where  you  may  see 
things  from  above.  It  is  like  standing  on  a  sum- 
mit, with  the  clouds  below  you,  and  the  thunders 


THE    CALL   TO   THE    HEIGHTS  25 

rolling  at  your  feet.     Below  are  unrest  and  terror, 
but   above  is   calm.    How  different  death  would  f 
seem  from  the  heavenly  view-point!     In  what  a  ; 
new  light  sorrow  would  shine  forth ! 

A  man  who  had  reached  the  heights  of  peace  and 
power  said :  ' '  I  was  born  in  poverty,  and  I  had  a  ' 
withered  arm  from  birth,  but  it  never  dawned 
upon  me  until  I  was  fourteen  that  narrow  circum- 
stances and  a  bodily  disability  were  just  what  I 
needed  to  make  the  most  of  my  powers.  It  was " 
when  I  said  to  my  father,  *I  am  poor  and  lame,' 
and  he  said,  quoting  Scripture,  *The  lame  take 
the  prey.'  Then  I  saw  that  what  I  had  always 
thought  of  as  weights  might  turn  out  to  be  wings. ' ' 
When  that  awakening  comes  to  us,  we  have  begun 
to  ascend.  The  office  of  religion  is  just  this:  to 
point  to  the  high  mountain  and  remind  us  that 
there  is  our  home.  History  says,  ''Look  back." 
Science  says,  "Look  around."  Philosophy  sajs, 
''Look  in."  Religion  says,  **Look  up.  Get  thee 
up  on  a  high  mountain." 

A  psalmist  declares,  "He  maketh  my  feet  like 
hinds '  feet. ' '  Have  you  ever  seen  a  stag,  outlined 
against  the  sky,  sure-footed  on  the  far-off  cliff? 
The  mountain  is  its  home.  So,  what  the  psalmist 
says  is  this,  ' '  By  faith,  I  stand  on  high,  serene  and 
strong. ' ' 

"Thou  that  tellest  good  tidings."  This  is  the 
message  of  the  prophet,  and  the  prophet  is  the 
teacher  of  religion.  This  is  the  character  of  his 
message,  it  is  good  tidings.  Is  not  this  the  very  term 
the  New  Testament  applies  to  the  Gospel,  "Evan- 


26  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

gelion,"  good  tidings?  We  get  our  words  ''evan- 
gel," ''evangelist,"  "evangelical,"  from  that  word 
which  means  good  news.  At  first  the  word  meant 
a  present  given  on  account  of  good  news.  In  At- 
tic Greek,  it  meant  a  sacrifice  offered  on  receipt  of 
good  news,  but  in  the  New  Testament,  it  means 
the  good  news  itself.  Strange  it  is  that  the  Gospel 
of  good  tidings  has  ever  been  interpreted  so  as  to 
convey  to  men  any  other  impression  than  that  it  is 
good  tidings.  The  Master  Himself  made  it  clear 
that  He  came  not  to  condemn  the  world,  but  to 
save  it  from  condemnation;  not  to  curse  the  world, 
but  to  remove  the  curse;  not  to  limit  life,  but  to 
enlarge  it.     Long  ago  it  had  become  a  proverb, 

As  cold  waters  to  a  thirsty  soul,  so  is  good  news 
from  a  far  country."  That  is  what  Christianity 
^is.     It  is  what  the  Son  of  Man  came  to  tell  us. 

The  two  things  that  the  world  has  most  wished 
for  in  moments  of  fancy  are  the  philosopher's 
stone,  to  turn  base  metal  into  gold,  and  the  foun- 
tain of  perpetual  youth  in  which  the  time-worn 
pilgrim  may  wash  away  the  scars  of  years.  If 
such  things  were  real,  who  would  not  make  any  pil- 
grimage, pay  any  price,  to  obtain  the  one  and 
reach  the  other?  Men  have  grown  gray  and  some 
have  even  lost  their  reason  trying  to  solve  the  prob- 
lem of  transmuting  metals.  The  discoverer  of 
Florida  was  an  aged  soldier  who  thought  to  find 
there  the  fabled  waters.  0,  sons  of  earth,  what  if 
these  dreams  be  but  the  shadows  of  things  that  are  ? 
What  if  in  this  Book  there  be  the  basis  of  a  faith 
that  does  turn  the  common  things  of  life  into  the 


THE   CALL   TO   THE   HEIGHTS  27 

gold  of  the  soul  ?  And  what  if  here  we  may  learn 
the  secret  of  eternal  life?  Then  it  is  good  tidings, 
indeed.  Well,  many  have  found  it  so.  Close  beside 
the  bitter  fountain  in  the  wilderness  grows  the 
sweetening  branch.  The  smitten  rock,  from  which 
gushed  forth  the  river,  was  but  a  symbol  of  Him 
who  said  at  Jacob's  well;  "The  water  that  I  shall 
give  him  shall  be  in  him  a  well  of  water  springing 
up  into  everlasting  life."     Good  news! 

The  deepest  hunger,  the  keenest  thirst  we  know,f 
is  for  truth.  Burdened  with  sin,  we  cry,  ''Is  for- 
giveness possible  ? ' '  When  woe  fills  to  overflowing 
the  cup  of  life,  when  disaster  follows  disaster,  and 
the  plans  we  have  made  come  crashing  down  about 
us,  we  say:  ''Is  there  a  Father  who  knows  and 
cares  ?  Has  He  comfort  and  strength  for  us  now  ? ' ' 
Sitting  in  darkened  chambers  beside  our  dead,  we 
ask:  "Is  there  another  life  where  the  broken 
strands  of  this  shall  be  re-knit  ? "  If  any  man  can 
answer  these  questions  to  our  rational  satisfaction, 
how  glad  and  thankful  we  shall  be !  Then  glad  and 
thankful  we  should  be,  for  One  has  answered  them. 
He  speaks  as  one  who  knows.  He  has  the  accent  of 
authority  and  the  tone  of  power.  There  is  no  halt 
in  His  gait  or  haze  in  His  eyes  as  He  calmly  speaks 
of  pardon,  and  inward  reinforcement,  and  the 
Father's  many  mansions.  He  is  not  afraid,  and 
His  servants  should  not  be. 

"Lift  up  thy  voice  with  strength.  ...  Be 
not  afraid." — Observe  the  positiveness  of  the  mes- 
sage,- and  the  consequent  boldness  of  the  messen- 
ger.   But  why  should  we  be  afraid?     AVhat  have 


28  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

we  to  fear?  You  say,  "There  is  so  much  to  fear; 
there  is  the  paralyzing  consciousness  of  the  over- 
mastering power  of  things  present  and  visible; 
there  is  the  tyranny  of  flesh  and  sense ;  there  is  the 
bold  denial  of  materialism;  there  is  the  supercil- 

tious  sneer  of  Epicureanism.  There  is  the,  colossal 
conceit  of  rationalism;  and,  worst  of  all,  there  is 
the  insidious  strain  of  skepticism  in  us  all  which 
meets  the  affirmatives  of  faith  with  the  thought, 

^*It  is  too  good  to  be  true.'  "  What  are  we  to  do? 
The  text  answers,  * '  Lift  up  thy  voice  with  strength. 
.     .     .     Be  not  afraid."     Say  to  them  that  are  of 

'a  fearful  heart,  "Nothing  is  too  good  to  be  true  if 
God  be  its  Author. ' '  And  God  is  the  Author  of  the 
Gospel  of  His  Son. 

"Say  unto  the  cities  of  Judah,  Behold  your 
God. ' '  Has  the  city  then  a  special  need  of  this  mes- 
sage? Was  there  a  city  problem  so  long  ago? 
Rome  was  not  yet  built;  it  was  just  beginning. 
There  were  a  few  shepherds'  huts  along  the  Tiber. 
Where  the  great  cities  of  the  modern  world  now 
stand  was  untraversed  wilderness.  But  there  was 
Jerusalem.  And  Tyre  and  Sidon  and  Damascus 
and  Babylon  were  great.  Then,  as  now,  there 
were  wealth  and  poverty,  virtue  and  vice,  the 
strong  and  the  weak,  the  oppressor  and  the  op- 
pressed, side  by  side.  Then,  as  now,  the  wicked 
flourished,  and  corruption  promised  large  divi- 
dends; then,  as  now,  the  glutton  feasted,  and  the 
beggar  waited  at  his  gate;  then,  as  now,  the  suc- 
cessful man  said  to  his  soul,  "Soul,  .  .  .  take 
thine  ease;"  then,  as  now,  the  lust  of  the  eye,  the 


THE    CALL   TO   THE    HEIGHTS  29 

lust  of  the  flesh,  and  the  pride  of  life  all  too  easily 
blotted  out  the  vision  of  the  Ideal ;  then,  as  now,  or- 
ganized society  needed  a  Saviour,  and  so,  to  the 
cities  of  Judah,  the  prophet  must  cry  ' '  Behold  your 
God!" 

Can  the  thought  of  God  cure  the  ills  of  the  city, 
our  city,  where  commerce  dominates  everything, 
and  industry  is  personified  by  the  man  with  a  muck 
rake,  or  the  man  with  a  hoe?  Can  the  thought  of 
God  save  New  York  and  London,  Paris  and  Chi- 
cago, Peking  and  San  Francisco?  No;  but  the 
thought  of  God  can  uplift  the  minds  of  men,  and 
clarify  their  vision  until  they  see  that  only  as  the 
grace  of  God  enters  into  human  life,  only  as  the 
presence  of  God  becomes  a  restraining  and  con- 
straining force,  can  there  be  any  individual  worth 
or  social  safety.  The  vision  of  Paul  saved  many  a 
city  of  Asia  Minor.  The  vision  of  Savonarola 
saved  Florence.  The  vision  of  Luther  saved  Eu- 
rope. The  vision  of  Wesley  saved  England.  And 
Christ  was  the  center  of  that  saving  vision. 

The  city  is  to  be  saved  only  as  the  individuals 
of  which  it  is  composed  are  saved.     Each  of  us 
can  help  to  build  the  city  in  righteousness  by  prac- 
ticing the  Gospel  of  God  incarnate.     The  history* 
of  our  race  began  in  the  country — in  Eden.     But  j 
it  is  to  end  in  the  city — ^New  Jerusalem.     Midway  I 
between    Eden    and    New   Jerusalem    is    Babylon,  j 
We  are  in  Babylon  now.     But  every  life  hid  with  ^ 
Christ  in  God,  every  soul  devoted  to  the  will  of 
God,  every  ' '  union  of  those  who  love  in  the  service  f 
of   those    who    suffer,"    is    helping   to    transform/ 
earth's  Babylon  into  God's  New  Jerusalem. 


Ill 

THE  GREAT  APPEAL 


// 


"I  am  moved  more  by  my  vision  of  the.  personality  of 
Jesus  than  I  am  by  my  thought  of  His  doctrines.  Spiritual 
growth  is  brought  about  by  the  impact  of  nobler  souls  on 
ours.  Consequently,  I  cannot  understand  the  Voltaire-like 
petulance  v»ith  which,  in  his  Divinity  School  Address,  Emer- 
son banished  'the  person  of  Jesus'  from  genuine  religion. 
He  thinks  that  you  cannot  be  a  man  if  you  'must  subordi- 
nate your  nature  to  Christ's  nature.'  It  seems  to  me, 
however,  that  you  realize  your  capacities  only  by  coming 
into  contact  W'ith  their  realization  in  others.  The  objectified 
self  reveals  the  subjective  aptitude ;  and  with  the  thrill  of  dis- 
covery begins  the  higher  development.  Spiritual  growth  is 
the  attainment  of  those  who  constantly  look  up  to  higher 
personalities.  Now  if  it  is  true  of  Jesus  Christ  (as  Emerson 
says  in  the  address)  that  'alcne  in  all  history  He  estimated 
the  greatness  of  man:  one  man  was  true  to  w^hat  is  in  you 
and  me,'  then  I  should  say  that  you  and  I  are  to  find  our 
own  highest  life  by  opening  our  souls  to  the  influence  of  this 
perfect  and  absolute  personality.  Nay,  as  Jesus  Christ  was 
perfect  man,  so  also,  and  for  that  very  reason,  was  He  the 
revelation  and  realization  of  the  Divine  Father.  In  the  new 
dispensation  of  spirit,  as  in  the  old  of  dogma,  He  must 
therefore,  in  some  sense,  if  not  the  orthodox  sense,  continue 
to  be  our  Mediator  and  Saviour." 

(Agnosticism  and  Religion,  Jacob  Gould  Schurman.  pp.  180, 
181.) 


Ill 

THE   GREAT   APPEAL, 
"Never  man  spake   like  this  man."     John  vii.  46. 

This  was  the  testimony  of  all  who  heard  Him, — 
priests,  scribes,  Pharisees,  Sadducees,  Romans, 
Greeks,  Samaritans,  Syro-Phoenicians.  With  one 
accord  they  all  declared,  "Never  man  spake  like 
this  man.'' 

He  spoke  with  a  certainty  that  others  lacked. 
The  modern  ministry  that  '^ ventures  to  assert" 
that  if  we  do  not  repent,  ''so  to  speak,"  and  be  con- 
verted, '  *  as  it  were, ' '  we  shall  be  lost,  "  in  a  sense, ' ' 
did  not  learn  its  lesson  from  Him.  His  word  was 
*' Verily,  verily." 

He  spoke  with  an  authority  that  differenced  Him 
from  others.  Others  quoted  the  opinions  of  the 
ancients  and  the  fathers.  Others  stood  upon  prec- 
edents and  were  full  of  classic  instances.  But 
Jesus  was  His  own  authority.  He  created  prece- 
dents. He  prefaced  His  great  sayings  with,  ''I 
say  unto  you."  He  spoke  with  a  sanity,  which 
though  it  was  not  always  apparent  to  His  contem- 
poraries, is  clearly  seen  by  us  to  have  been  a  fea- 
ture of  His  doctrine  which  elevates  Him  far  above 
every  other  teacher  of  His  age  and  of  subsequent 
ages.    Moreover,  He  spoke  with  absolute  fearless- 

33 


/ 


34  COLLEGE    SERMONS 

ness.  Neither  Jewish  bigotry  nor  Roman  power 
nor  Greek  scorn  could  silence  His  faithful  lips  or 
overcome  His  hero  soul,  or  cause  Him  to  dilute  the 
truth  for  tender  ears.  Hebrew  religiosity  was 
shallow  and  hollow,  and  He  knew  and  despised  it. 
Roman  power  was  a  mere  phantasm,  and  He  so 
characterized  it.  Greek  wisdom  was  short-sighted 
and  He  ignored  it.  The  Roman  procurator  asked 
Him  ''What  is  truth?"  And  He  answered,  with- 
out apology,  ' '  I  am  the  Truth. ' ' 

Considered,  too,  as  to  the  simplicity,  the  crystal 
clearness,  the  perfect  transparency,  of  His  teach- 
ing, ''never  man  spake  like  this  man."  Words 
may  be  made  to  conceal  or  reveal  thought.  Rous- 
seau once  remarked  that  definition  would  be  so 
much  easier  if  it  were  not  for  the  necessity  of  using 
words!  The  best  literature  suffers,  necessarily, 
from  translation  into  a  foreign  tongue,  however 
flexible  or  copious  that  tongue  may  be.  But 
turned  into  whatever  mould  of  language,  the  truth 
Jesus  taught  is  so  plain  that  wayfaring  men  need 
not  err  therein. 

In  this  respect  English  literature  has  few  au- 
thors to  remind  us  of  Jesus'  words.  One  such, 
however,  is  John  Bunyan,  whose  mastery  of  terse, 
tense  speech  was  due  to  his  intimate  knowledge 
of  the  Holy  Scriptures.  A  Scotch  preacher  wrote 
a  compientary  on  "Pilgrim's  Progress"  and  a 
woman  who  read  it  told  the  author  that  she  un- 
derstood "Pilgrim's  Progress"  thoroughly,  and 
hoped  some  time  to  be  able  to  comprehend  his 
notes ! 


THE   GREAT   APPEAL  35 

Some  writers  are  luminous;  others  are  volumin-  i 
ous.  The  recorded  words  of  Jesus  are  few,  but 
they  are  like  a  gushing  fountain  in  the  heart  of 
the  hills.  Rivers  have  their  sources  in  its  pure  and 
unexhausted  depths.  So — as  to  certainty,  au- 
thority, sanity,  courage,  and  clearness,  *' never 
man  spake  like  this  man."  This  is  why  He  ap- 
peals to  humanity  so  powerfully.  This  is  why  He 
has  taken  deeper  hold  upon  the  race  than  any  other, 
— taken  hold  with  a  grasp  that  time  does  not  di- 
minish. 

Spite  of  the  fact  that  Christianity  has  never 
numbered  among  its  adherents  more  than  a  third 
of  the  world's  population,  the  influence  of  Jesus 
on  the  intellectual  and  moral  life  of  mankind  has 
produced  radical  and  even  revolutionary  changes 
in  the  thought  and  sympathies  of  nine-tenths  of 
the  really  constructive  races  of  the  world. 

There  have  been  times  when  the  power  of  Chris- 
tianity seemed  to  be  spent,  when  its  future  seemed 
uncertain,  and  its  very  existence  in  peril.  In  the 
fifteenth  century  and  again  in  the  eighteenth,  the 
Star  of  Bethlehem  shone  but  dimly  through  the 
mists  of  shifting  systems  and  theories.  But  every 
such  era  of  doubt  has  been  succeeded  by  a  renais- 
sance of  faith,  and  when  men  who  had  lost  sight  of 
the  Star  looked  again  they  saw  a  light  above  the 
brightness  of  the  sun. 

Bishop  Warren,  in  his  little  book,  **The  Miracu- 
lous Element  in  Christianity,''  points  out  that 
there  have  been  six  distinct  assaults  on  Chris- 
tianity : 


36  COLLEGE    SERMOXS 

The  first  was  in  the  lifetime  of  Jesus  by  those 
who  hated  Him. 

The  heathen  assault  followed. 

The  third  was  pantheistic  and  was  led  by  Spi- 
noza. 

The  fourth  was  the  skeptical  philosophy  of 
Hume. 

The  fifth  was  the  rationalistic  theory  of  Paulus 
and  his  followers. 

The  sixth  is  the  historico-critical  attack  of 
Strauss  and  Wellhausen  and  that  school. 

The  first  five  failed,  or  there  would  have  been  no 
necessity  for  a  sixth.  The  sixth  has  already 
reached  its  power  and  begun  to  decline,  and  still 
is  Christ  exalted;  still  the  world  clings  to  Him, 
because,  whatever  of  human  interpretation  has 
been  revised,  whatever  that  had  been  superim- 
posed on  Christianity  has  been  removed,  Jesus 
Christ  remains  with  His  eternal  appeal  to  man. 
The  great  appeal,  Jesus  Christ's  appeal  to  man, 
remains.  I  do  .not  mean  His  entreaty.  His  invita- 
tion, His  **Come  unto  Me"  (O  word  of  words  the 
sweetest!),  but  that  something  in  His  person  and 
character,  that  august  and  winsome  something 
which  evokes  a  wonderful  response  on  the  part  of 
the  unprejudiced  normal  man.  I  use  the  word 
"appeal''  in  the  same  sense  in  which  we  use  it  in 
speaking  of  a  picture,  a  poem,  a  statue,  an  argu- 
ment, a  proposition,  or  a  cause,  when  we  say  "It 
appeals"  to  us,  or  "It  does  not  appeal"  to  us. 

There  are  pictures  that  appeal  to  us.  There  is 
music  that  appeals  to  us.     There  are  lines  of  argu- 


THE   GREAT  APPEAL  37 

ment  that  appeal  to  us,  convince  us,  compel  us  to 
give  assent  to  them.  You  know  what  it  is  in  Hof- 
endon's  picture,  *' Breaking  Home  Ties,"  that  ap-' 
peals  to  us.  It  speaks  to  that  almost  universal  ex- 
perience in  the  memory  of  men  who  can  never  for- 
get the  day  when  the  little  bark  of  their  lives  glided 
out  from  the  love-locked  harbor  of  their  childhood's 
home.  You  know  what  it  is  in  Millet's  *' Angelus" 
that  appeals  to  us.  There  is  a  concrete  illustration 
of  the  world's  three  greatest  thoughts,  work,  love, 
God.  You  know  what  it  is  in  Raphael's  Madonna 
that  appeals  to  us.  It  speaks  to  us.  It  tells  more 
eloquently  than  words  could  tell  the  dignity  of 
motherhood,  the  sanctity  of  childhood,  the  mystery 
of  the  Incarnation. 

There  are  poems  that  have  the  power  of 
personal  appeal.  Longfellow's  * 'Psalm  of  Life,'* 
Aldrich's  ''Ballad  of  Babie  Bell,"  Burns 's 
"Highland  Mary"  all  have  it.  "The  Ballad 
of  Reading  Gaol"  may  take  its  place  with  the 
great  poems  of  appeal  when  we  have  forgotten  who 
wrote  it.  There  are  musical  compositions  that 
exercise  this  spell  over  us.  "The  Pilgrims'  Cho- 
rus," from  "Tannhauser"  and  Dvorak's  "New 
World  Symphony" — made  half  of  melody  and 
half  of  hope, — woo  and  win  even  the  untrained 
ear. 

Now  what  is  it  in  the  very  thought  of  Christ  that 
appeals  to  all  who  come  face  to  face  with  Him? 
We  do  not  all  honor  the  appeal — rise  to  meet  it — 
but  even  those  who  fail  to  respond  to  it  recognize 
in  Him  the  power  that  says  "Come," — says  it  so 


38  COLLEGE    SERMONS 

miglitil}^,  so  winsomely,  that  they  have  to  quench 
their  best  impulses  to  resist  it. 
f  It  is  what  He  was,  and  what  He  eternally  is. 
[Even  if  we  knew  of  no  miracle  He  ever  wrought; 
even  if  no  direct  word  of  His  had  floated  to  us 
across  the  troubled  waters  of  twice  a  thousand 
years;  if  we  had  no  other  picture  of  Him  than 
that  the  evangelists  give  us, — the  picture  of  a 
soul  more  conscious  of  God  than  of  Himself,  more 
conscious  of  eternity  than  of  time;  so  spiritual, 
yet  so  practical;  so  just,  yet  so  compassionate;  so 
leonine,  yet  so  in  love  with  peace;  so  solitary,  yet 
so  comradelike; — I  say  if  we  had  only  that  por- 
trait of  Him,  divested  of  all  miracle  and  all  para- 
ble, we  would  still  be  sensible  of  an  infinite  appeal. 
The  world  is  greatly  in  error  in  supposing  that 
our  faith  in  Jesus  Christ  rests  upon  what  He  did  and 
said.  It  rests,  rather,  upon  what  He  was,  and  is. 
I  "We  believe  in  His  miracles  because  we  believe  in 
vHim.  But  He  is  greater  than  any  miracle  He  ever 
wrought,  by  so  much  as  an  artist  is  greater  than 
his  work,  by  so  much  as  the  whole  is  greater  than  a 
part.  If  you  want  miracles — miracles  of  ancient 
and  modern  times — miracles  no  one  can  doubt  or 
deny, — study  the  appeal  of  Christ  to  men. 

Imagine,  if  you  can,  a  perfect  man,  a  character 
in  whom  all  the  elements  of  strength  are  so  blended 
as  to  produce  no  excess,  leave  no  deficiency,  and 
you  have  the  man  of  all  men  to  whom  Jesus  Christ 
would  most  powerfully  appeal.  If  we  w^ere  to 
meet  such  a  man  we  would  say  *' There  is  a  per- 
fect type  of  the  Christian!"     And  in  so  saying 


THE    GREAT   APPEAL  39 

we  pay  tribute  to  Christ.  We  recognize  in  the  per- 
fect man  the  perfect  image  of  Him. 

The  difficulty  of  defining  what  has  been  called 
the  appeal  of  Christ  is  in  itself  a  testimony  to  the 
extraordinary  character  of  that  appeal.  An  ax- 
iom is  a  self-evident  truth.  It  is  useless  to  prove 
that  things  that  are  equal  to  the  same  thing  are 
equal  to  each  other.  It  proves  itself.  It  is  folly  to 
argue  that  a  straight  line  is  the  shortest  distance 
between  two  points.     It  argues  itself. 

Color  is  self -evidencing  to  the  eye.  (If  it  is  not, 
the  fault  is  not  in  the  color,  but  in  the  eye.  Con- 
sult the  oculist  not  the  chemist.)  Music  is  self- 
evidencing  to  the  ear.  (If  it  is  not,  the  ear  needs 
treating.)  Beauty  is  self -evidencing  to  the  taste. 
The  surgeon  who  spoke  of  a  ''beautiful  surgical 
operation"  had  confused  technical  skill  with 
beauty.  The  Pacific  Ocean  was  self-evidencing  to 
the  mind  of  the  first  European  navigator  who  be- 
held it.  Balboa  knew  from  the  swell  of  the  tides 
that  this  was  no  inland  sea. 

The  Christian  world  has  a  definite  conception  of 
the  person  of  Christ.  It  is  not  what  one  man 
thinks  of  Him,  but  a  composite  photograph  of  what 
all  men  see  in  Him — of  what  all  men  always  have 
seen  in  Him.  Each  of  us  has  in  his  mind's  eye  a 
figure  of  Christ  to  the  making  of  which  all  Chris- 
tians and  all  creeds  have  contributed.  And  when 
that  conception  of  Christ  occurs  to  any  man — to 
any  man  not  already  prejudiced  against  Him — the 
effect  is  self-evidencing.  By  no  process  of  logic, 
but  by  an  act  of  intuitive  moral  judgment,  we  hail 


40  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

Him  as  one  like  unto  no  other.     Never  man  ap- 
pealed to  us  as  He  appeals  to  us. 

His  appeal  is  to  the  whole  man ;  it  is  self -evidenc- 
ing; and  it  reveals  its  masterfulness  by  its  silence. 
The  great  forces  of  the  world  are  silent.     Silent 
the  sunshine  that  brings  the  world  to  beauty  and 
^bounty.     Silent  the  light   that  repeats,   in   every 
/  sunset  sky,  the  miracle  of  Cana  of  Galilee — water 
I  turned  to  wine.     Silent  the  invisible  weaver,  life, 
sitting  at  its  little  loom  we  call  the  cell,  weaving  a 
manifold  fabric  of  grass  and  tree  and  flower  and 
flesh.     Silent  the  planets  that  wheel  their  stately 
way  around  the  sun.     Silent  the  forces  that  lift 
oceans  into  the  sky. 

Seven  hundred  years  before  the  advent  of  Jesus, 
a  Hebrew  prophet  caught  a  glimpse  of  His  coming, 
and  of  His  ministry,  and  said,  ' '  He  shall  not  strive, 
nor  cry."  When  He  came  there  was  no  such 
frenzy  as  sometimes  attends  the  birth  of  a  prince. 
He  grew  to  manhood  through  thirty  years  of  ob- 
scurity. He  had  no  armies  to  attend  Him,  no 
retinue  of  servants  and  retainers.  He  was  al- 
together unlike  the  great  of  earth. 

Pierre  Fritel  has  painted  "The  Conquerors." 
There  are  Xerxes,  and  Alexander,  and  Caesar,  and 
Genghis  Khan,  and  Attila,  and  Napoleon,  on  war- 
rhorses,  under  banners,  trumpets  sounding,  drums 
I  beating,  cymbals  clashing.  So  the  earthly  great 
have  come.  Not  so  the  great  of  heaven.  ''The 
Kingdom  of  God  cometh  not  with  observation." 
Jesus  Christ  is  King  and  Conqueror  in  a  realm 
where  only  the  *' still  small  voice"  is  heard.     The 


THE   GREAT   APPEAL  41 

light  of  the  new  life  comes  like  dawn  on  the  moun- 
tains. 

"Will  the  East  unveil?     The  East  is  unveiled! 
Have  a  care,  sweet  heaven,  'tis  dawn!" 

The  life  of  God  in  the  soul  of  the  believer  comes 
like  the  springtime.  Springtime  beats  no  gong, 
issues  no  prospectus,  but  one  day  there  is  a  riot 
of  green  in  the  trees,  and  a  patch  of  purple  on 
south-lying  hillsides  where  a  week  ago  was  snow. 
A  robin  sounds  a  cheery  note  from  the  hedge  and 
spring  is  at  the  portal  of  the  year ! 

It  is  wonderful,  when  we  yield  to  the  appeal  of 
Christ,  to  feel,  as  time  goes  by,  new  impulses  grow- 
ing in  us ;  new  pity  for  all  pain ;  new  longing  after 
truth;  new  devotion  to  duty;  new  confidence  in 
prayer;  new  assurance  of  immortality.  God  is 
working  in  us,  and  "now  is  our  salvation  nearer 
than  when  we  believed." 


ly 

MAN'S   KESPONSE   TO   CHRIST'S   APPEAL 


"So  much  for  the  individual.  But  positive  evidence  does 
not  end  here.  Look  at  the  effects  of  Christian  belief  as  ex- 
ercised on  human  society — 1st,  by  individual  Christians  on 
the  family,  etc. ;  and,  2d,  by  the  Christian  Church  on  the 
world. 

"All  this  may  lead  on  to  an  argument  from  the  adaptation 
of  Christianity  to  human  higher  needs.  All  men  must  feel 
these  needs  more  or  less  in  proportion  as  their  higher  na- 
tures, moral  and  spiritual,  are  developed.  Now  Christianity 
is  the  only  religion  which  is  adapted  to  meet  them,  and, 
according  to  those  who  are  alone  able  to  testify,  does  so 
most  abundantly.  All  these  men,  of  every  sect,  nationality, 
etc.,  agree  in  their  account  of  their  subjective  experience ;  so 
as  to  this  there  can  be  no  question.  The  only  question  is 
as  to  whether  they  are  all  deceived." 

{Thoughts   on   Religion.     George   John    Romanes,     pp.    162,    163.) 

"And  now  from  all  this  we  may  come  to  a  definition.  If 
one  were  asked  to  state  in  terms  what  a  Christian  is,  I 
should  say  something  like  this :  a  Christian  is  one  who  is 
responding  to  whatever  meanings  of  Christ  are,  through 
God's  Spirit,  being  brought  home  to  his  intellectual  or  moral 
conscience.  This  is  a  definition  at  once  exhaustive  of  the 
profoundest  Christianity  and  admissive  of  the  simplest.  The 
meanings  of  Christ,  either  for  thought  or  life,  that  one  man 
may  be  able  to  respond  to  with  intellectual  assent  or  prac- 
tical obedience,  will  be  many  and  advanced ;  another  man 
may,  with  equal  earnestness  and  effort,  be  able,  from  his 
constitution,  upbringing  or  circumstances,  to  respond  to  but 
the  most  elementary.  Yet  both  are  Christians  if  both  are 
responding  with  a  faithful  conscience." 

{The  Fact  of  Christ.  P.  Carnegie  Simpson,  M.A.  pp.  195, 
196.) 


IV 

MAN^S  RESPONSE  TO  CHRIST  ^S  APPEAL 

"To  whom  shall  we  go?     Thou  hast  the  words  of  eternal 
life."     John   vi.   68. 

Mr.  P.  Carnegie  Simpson  has  given  us  a  brilliant 
and  remarkable  little  book,  called  **Tlie  Fact  of 
Christ."    His  argument  is  lucid  and  his  statement 
felicitous.     He  makes  plain  that  whatever  may  be 
our   theories   to   account   for  the   phenomena   of 
Christianity,  and  however  we  may  differ  in  our 
statement  of  principles  involved,  there  is,  underly-  i 
ing  them  all,  the  indubitable  fact  that  Jesus  Christ  I 
made  an  impression  upon  the  world,  and  intro-  1 
duced  a  force  into  the  world,  to  account  for  which  f 
demands  both  intellectual  and  moral  candor. 

No  student  of  history  doubts  for  a  moment  that 
Jesus  Christ  appeals  to  man  as  does  no  other  char- 
acter in  human  history.  His  appeal  is  not  alone 
to  the  whole  man,  that  is,  to  the  entire  range  of 
his  faculties,  but,  in  a  remarkable  way.  He  appeals 
to  the  whole  of  humanity.  Mohammed  appeals  to 
the  Arab,  the  Turk,  the  fierce  and  fatalistic  nomad 
of  the  East.  Buddha  appeals  to  the  reflective  mind 
of  the  Orient.  Jesus  Christ's  appeal  is  uniquely"^ 
cosmopolitan.  He  holds  the  scepter  of  the  Western 
world,  and  yet  a  learned  Hindoo  has  said,  ''None 

45 


46  COLLEGE    SERMONS 

but  Jesus  deserves,  and  none  but  He  shall  have  the 
diadem  of  India/' 
\  It  is  a  fundamental  principle  of  pedagogy,  *'No 
I  impression  without  corresponding  expression." 
Let  us  inquire  what  impression  the  fact  of  Christ 
has  made  on  the  mind  of  man,  and  if  we  can,  let 
us  give  expression  to  it. 

Let  us  translate  ourselves,  so  far  as  we  are  able, 
to  the  first  century  of  the  era,  to  Jerusalem  after 
Pentecost,  or  to  Ephesus,  while  John  is  still  living 
and  teaching,  or  to  Rome,  when  Paul  is  living  in 
his  own  hired  house,  preaching  the  Gospel  to  little 
groups  of  freemen  and  slaves,  who  come  to  him  for 
instruction.     What  is  our  first  thought  as  we  ob- 
serve what  is   going  on?     One   Name   is   on  the 
lips  of  all  the  members  of  this  little  sect.     They 
whisper  it  in  prayers  and  chant  it  in  songs.     They 
greet     each     other     and     part,     in     that     Name. 
They    break    bread    together    and    talk    of    Him. 
They  bury  their  dead  in  His  Name  and  carve  His 
Name  upon  their  tombs.     The  slave  is  no  longer 
servile,  and  the  master  no  longer  pitiless.    The  hum- 
ble are  bold,  and  the  strong  are  tender.     Persecu- 
tions come,  and  the  persecuted  suffer  the  ruin  of 
their  fortunes   and  the  peril  of  their  lives  with 
/serenity  and  courage.     All  of  which  is  not  natural. 
I  It  is  natural  for  the  slave  to  hang  his  head,  and 
^for  the  master  to  scorn  his  human  chattels.     It 
4 is  natural  for  the  lowly  to  abase  themselves,  and 
Ifor  the  strong  to  lord  it  over  the  humble.     It  is 
jnatural  for  a  man  to  cling  to  his  possessions,  and 
\hold  life  above  all  else.     Selfishness  is  the  oldest 


man's  kesponse  to  Christ's  appeal       47 

custom  of  the  race.  Sin  is  the  deadly  drift  of  the  7 
ages.  But,  somehow,  the  custom  is  broken,  the 
drift  arrested.  By  what?  By  whom?  By  the 
mere  influence — we  will  call  it  that  for  lack  of  a 
better  name — of  a  crucified  peasant!  Was  He  a 
scholar?  No.  Did  He  write  any  books?  Not  one. 
Was  He  a  poet  ?  No.  Did  He  sing  any  songs  and 
so  ''call  cowards  up  to  duty  in  commanding 
rhyme"?  Never.  Then  He  must  have  been  a 
soldier,  a  warrior,  a  great  captain?  Not  that.  A 
political  leader,  inaugurating  a  new  social  order? 
Nor  that.     What  then  ? 

I  need  not  answer  that  question.  That  it  is  asked 
proves  what  is  the  first  impression  Jesus  Christ 
has  made  on  us  and  on  the  world.  Wonder, 
stupendous  and  unending  wonder,  is  our  first  im- 
pression. Immeasurable  surprise  is  the  first  re- 
sponse in  man  to  Christ's  appeal.  » 

We  ask.  What  did  Jesus  propose  to  do?     We  ^ 

see  what  He  is  doing  among  men,  but  the  question 
is.  What  did  He  purpose  to  do?  Some  men  go  all 
through  life  without  a  purpose.  But  most  of  us 
form  a  purpose  before  we  have  passed  far  into 
the  years  of  youth.  With  one,  it  is  to  make  a 
fortune,  with  another  to  win  fame,  with  others,  to 
carve,  or  paint,  or  write,  or  fight,  or  build,  or  heal, 
or  plough.  Now  what  did  Jesus  conceive  His  life 's 
task  to  be?  Our  wonder  increases  when  we  learn 
that  He  seriously  proposed  to  found  a  kingdom, 
to  destroy  the  works  of  evil,  to  institute  the  reign 
of  love  among  men  and  among  nations,  to  redeem 
society  by  bringing  back  to  goodness  and  to  God 


1^ 


y 


48  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

*  all  the  individuals  of  which  society  is  composed. 
Did  any  other  ever  undertake  a  task  like  that? 
Compared  with  it,  the  emancipation  of  a  race  of 
slaves,  or  even  the  founding  of  a  new  nation,  is  a 
small  thing. 

Go  a  little  further  into  His  life  and  you  will 
find  He  proposed  and  professed  to  solve  the  three 
greatest  and  gravest  problems  of  life — the  prob- 
lems of  sin,  and  sorrow,  and  death.  Now  look  at 
His  philosophy.  His  theology.  His  metaphysics, 
His  ethics,  His  system,  whatever  it  may  be  called, 
His  Gospel,  let  us  say,  and  you  will  see,  potentially 
if  not  actually,  the  materials  out  of  which  all  this 
is  to  be  done.  There  is  love,  pure  and  sacrificial, 
upon  which  to  found  a  kingdom  in  the  hearts  of 
men,  love  as  the  basis  of  a  new  brotherhood ;  there 
..^is^, grace  abounding  much  more  than  ever  sin 
n^^^^wounded ;  inward  strength  and  comfort  for  the 
heart  with  sorrow  laden;  and  there  is  immortality 
with  which  to  face  the  fearful  phantasm  of  death. 
All  these  elements  are  in  His  Gospel,  and  they  must 
impress  us  with  their  absolute  adequacy.  The 
causes  are  fully  equal  to  the  effects  desired.  The 
plaster  is  larger  than  the  wound. 

Surprise,  at  first,  and  afterwards,  a  sense  of 
adequacy,  are  awakened  by  a  study  of  the  fact  of 
Christ.  Then  follows  in  our  minds  the  tribute  we 
instinctively  pay  to  greatness,  to  simplicity,  and 
power.  A  good  part  of  the  admiration  we  have  for 
Abraham  Lincoln  is  based  upon  our  perception  of 
his  native  nobility,  his  elemental  simplicity.  He 
was  so  free  from  anything  like  artificial  greatness, 


man's  kesponse  to  Christ's  appeal       49 

from  the  counterfeit  semblance  of  dignity,  and  yet 
so  masterful,  so  completely  captain  of  his  soul, 
and  of  the  Ship  of  State  he  guided  through  the 
seething  sea  of  war.  It  is  easy  to  admire  a  man  of 
our  own  flesh  and  blood,  so  near  us  that  there  are 
those  still  living  who  have  touched  his  hand.  It 
is  not  so  easy  to  admire  a  personality  separated 
from  us  by  sixty  generations.  Yet  admiration  is 
a  feeble  word  to  measure  the  response  in  our  hearts 
when  we  hear  the  name  of  Mary's  Son.  He 
seems  not  so  far  away,  after  all.  We  read  the 
Gospels  and  arise  with  a  kind  of  feeling  that  if  we 
have  not  seen  Him,  we  have  at  least  heard  His  foot- 
fall on  the  temple 's  marble  pavement,  or  the  street, 
that  we  have  caught  some  accent  of  His  voice,  or 
touched  the  hem  of  His  passing  garments.  Whit- 
tier  puts  it  so : 

But  warm,  sweet,  tender,  even  yet 

A  present  help   is  He ; 
And  faith  has  still  its  Olivet, 

And  love  its  Galilee. 

The  healing  of  His  seamless  dress 

Is  by  our  beds  of  pain ; 
We  touch  Him  in  life's  throng  and  press. 

And  we  are  whole  again. 

No  phenomenon  within  all  the  range  of  con- 
sciousness is  more  inexplicable,  and  at  the  same 
time  more  indubitable,  than  the  nearness  of  Jesus 
to  His  disciples,  in  all  ages.  We  speak  of  the 
friendship  of  Jesus,  fellowship  with  Him,  com- 
radeship.    There  is  no  name  which  quite  satisfac- 


50  COLLEGE   SEKMONS 

torily  describes  the  experience.    Poetry  gives  us 
its  best  expression. 

"  *He  is  my  friend,'  I  said, — 
'Be  patient !'     Overhead 
The  skies  were  drear  and  dim, 
And  lo !  the  thought  of  Him 
Smiled  on  my  heart, — and  then 
The  sun  shone  out  again. 

"  *He  is  my  friend  !'     The  words 
Brought  summer  and  the  birds ; 
And  all  my  winter  time 
Thawed  into  running  rhyme, 
And  rippled  into  song, 
Warm,  tender,  brave,  and  strong." 

When  Elisha  had  succeeded  Elijah,  and  with  the 
prophetic  mantle  on  his  shoulders,  went  his  way, 
the  sons  of  the  prophets  saw  him,  and  the  story 
reads  that  they  saw  that  the  spirit  of  Elijah  rested 
on  him,  and  ''they  came  to  meet  him,  and  bowed 
themselves  to  the  ground  before  him."  That  was 
their  tribute  to-  his  greatness.     His  greatness  ap- 

r pealed  to  them  and  the  loyal  manhood  in  them  rec- 
ognized the  masterly  manhood  in  him.  What  shall 
we  call  that  sentiment  which  is  awakened  in  us 
by  our  recognition  of  the  royalty,  the  majesty, 
the  divinity,  and  with  it  all,  the  brotherly  advocacy, 
the  loverlike  ministry  of  Jesus  Christ?  Admira- 
tion is  .  not  the  word.  Reverence  ?  Adoration  ? 
Gratitude?  Worship?  Call  it  what  we  will,  it  is 
the  spirit  of  the  disciple  who  said,  ' '  To  whom  shall 
we  go  ?  Thou  hast  the  words  of  eternal  life. ' ' 
There  is  still  another  response  in  man  to  Christ's 


1 


man's  kesponse  to  cheist's  appeal       51 

appeal.  It  is  suggested  by  a  line  in  Longfellow's 
story  of  ''The  Sifting  of  Peter"; 

■'One  sight  of  that  pale,  suffering  face, 
Will  make  us  feel  the  deep  disgrace 
Of  weakness. 

A  mere  apprentice  cannot  set  his  crude  canvas 
beside  the  picture  of  a  master  without  a  sense  of 
shame.  The  contrast  is  too  evident.  When  we 
think  of  what  Christ  was, — pure,  and  there  is  no 
white  day  in  all  our  lives;  peaceable,  and  there 
is  something  in  us  that  delights  in  strife ;  unselfish, 
and  our  thoughts  center  in  "I"  and  "me"  and 
"mine";  when  we  think  of  how  dead  He  was 
to  all  low  aims,  and  how  alive  He  was  to  all  high 
thoughts  and  affections;  how  can  we  help  abhor- 
ring ourselves?  When  we  measure  ourselves  by 
comparison  with  Him,  unless  our  moral  faculties 
are  utterly  obtuse,  we  see  the  moral  distance  that 
separates  us  from  Him. 

As  a  rule,  the  holier  a  heart  grows,  the  more 
deeply  conscious  it  becomes  of  its  own  defilement. 
In  this  respect  Jesus  is  an  anomaly.     He  never 
confessed  a  sin  because  He  never  committed  one. 
Fine  example  of  humility  as  Jesus'  life  affords  us, 
there  is  never  a  consciousness  of  need  to  be  for- 
given.    On  the  tomb  of  Copernicus,   are  written^ 
these  words:  "Not  that  grace  which  Paul  received  I 
crave  I;  not  that  favor  with  which   Thou  didst  1 
pardon  Peter ;  but  that  which  Thou  didst  grant  the   I 
malefactor,    that   alone    crave    I."     There    is   the  / 
heart  of  the  true  believer.     The  sight  of   Christ 


52  COLLEGE    SERMONS 

has  brought  its  sense  of  shame.  But  the  shame 
of  the  penitent  never  sinks  to  despair.  It  rises  to 
hope,  and  it  dares  to  pray  with  the  dying  thief, 
*'Kemember  me.'* 

So,  this  is  the  manifold  response  in  man  to 
Christ's  manifold  appeal:  surprise,  apprehension 
♦  of  adequacy,  recognition  of  His  eternal  Saviour- 
hood,  self -consciousness  of  need,  and  faith  that  God 
is  able  to  supply  our  need  according  to  His  riches 
in  glory  by  Christ  Jesus. 


V 

A  DOUBTER'S  PRAYER 


"Constrained  at  the  darkest  hour  to  humbly  confess  that 
without  God's  help  I  was  helpless,  I  vowed  a  vow  in  the 
forest  solitude  that  I  would  confess  His  aid  before  men.  A 
silence  as  of  death  was  round  about  me ;  it  was  midnight ; 
I  was  weakened  by  illness,  prostrated  with  fatigue,  and  worn 
with  anxiety  for  my  white  and  black  companions,  whose  fate 
was  a  mystery. 

"In  this  physical  and  mental  distress  I  besought  God  to 
give  me  back  my  people.  Nine  hours  later  we  were  exult- 
ing with  rapturous  joy.  In  full  view  of  all  was  the  crimson 
flag  with  the  crescent,  and  beneath  its  waving  folds  was  the 
long-lost  rear  column. 

"As  I  mentally  review  the  many  grim  episodes,  and  re- 
flect on  the  marvelously  narrow  escapes  from  utter  destruc- 
tion to  which  we  have  been  subjected  during  our  various 
journeys  to  and  fro  through  the  immense  and  gloomy  extent 
of  primeval  wood,  I  feel  utterly  unable  to  attribute  our 
salvation  to  any  other  cause  than  to  a  gracious  Providence 
who,  for  some  purposes  of  His  own,  preserved  us. 

"Before  turning  in  for  the  night  I  resumed  my  reading 
of  the  Bible  as  usual.  I  had  already  read  the  book  through 
from  beginning  to  end,  once,  and  was  now  at  Deuteronomy 
for  the  second  reading,  and  I  came  unto  the  verse  where 
Moses  exhorts  Joshua  in  these  fine  lines :  'Be  strong  and  of 
a  good  courage,  fear  not,  nor  be  afraid  of  them :  for  the  Lord 
thy  God,  He  it  is  that  doth  go  with  thee;  He  will  not  fail 
thee,  nor  forsake  thee.'  " 

(/»    Darkest    Africa.    H.    M.    Stanley.     Vol.    ],    pp.    2,    4,    311.) 


A  doubter's  prayer 

"And  straightway  the  father  of  the  child  cried  out,  and 
said  with  tears,  Lord,  I  believe;  help  Thou  mine  unbelief." 
Mark  ix.  24. 

We  are  all  believers — at  times.  We  are  all 
doubters — at  times.  There  are  moments  of  belief 
and  moments  of  unbelief  in  every  life.  The  most 
thoroughly  confirmed  skeptic  has  his  hours  of 
faith,  and  the  most  confident  believer  has  his  hours 
of  doubt.  Life  is  a  curious  combination  of  oppo- 
sites.  The  hero  of  battles  is  afraid  to  speak  a  word 
from  a  public  platform;  the  frail  woman  rises  to 
heights  of  reckless  daring;  the  prudent  business 
man,  counsellor  of  nations,  becomes  the  dupe  of  a 
cheap  swindler;  the  professional  vagabond,  the 
drifter,  the  purposeless  and  passive  apostle  of 
leisure,  leaps,  in  one  glorious,  all-atoning  moment 
of  self-abandon,  to  the  death  of  one  than  whom 
''greater  love  hath  no  man," — only  the  tramp  lays  7 
down  his  life  for  a  stranger! 

A  newly  arrived  visitor  on  our  planet,  a  native 
of  Mars,  reading  certain  pages  of  human  history,^ 
would  be  much  confused,  and  possibly  diverted,^ 
by  the  apparent  inconsistencies  of  certain  pages  of 
earthly  history:     Benvenuto   Cellini  writes  with- 

55 


I 


56  COLLEGE   SEKMONS 

out  hesitation  of  his  pious  thoughts  and  fervent 
prayers  at  the  very  moment  he  is  meditating  the 
assassination  of  his  enemy;  John  Newton,  master 
of  a  slave  ship,  rejoices  in  the  possession  of  a 
peculiar  spiritual  peace;  the  Puritan  comes  to 
America  to  escape  religious  persecutioUj  and  turns 
persecutor  when  he  gets  into  the  saddle!  These 
are  instances  from  comparatively  modern  history, 
and  it  has  been  the  same  from  the  beginning. 
Abraham  could  lie  and  pray;  Elijah  could  with- 
stand the  king  to  his  face,  and  flee  from  the  wrath 
of  the  queen ;  Peter  could  betray  his  Lord,  and  die 
for  Him.  What  does  it  all  mean?  That  we  are 
all,  as  Peter  Cartwright  confessed  to  his  bishop, 
''sanctified  in  spots'*?  That  we  fall  within  the 
class  represented  by  the  person  whose  obituary  in 
a  country  newspaper  contained  the  curious  com- 
ment, "He  had  been  a  Christian,  off  and  on,  for 
fifty  years ' '  ? 

Are  moral  distinctions,  after  all,  not  clearly  de- 
fined?    Is  the  line  an  invisible  one — or  a  variable 
one — which  separates  the  true  from  the  false,  the 
good  from  the   evil?     It   is  neither,   but  human 
nature  is  variable,  and  God  has  not  yet  finished 
making  man.    No  good  man  is  wholly  good,  and 
no  bad  man  is  wholly  bad.     Character  is  not  a 
matter  of  isolated  circumstances  and  events,  but 
of  the  general  tendency  of  one's  life.     No  one  of 
wus  is  what  he  seems  to  be  at  any  particular  time, 
Ibut  he  is  what  he  is  with  reference  to  what  he 
Vas,  and  to  what  he  aspires  to  be.     The  evil  that 
lexists  in  good  lives  is  there  to  impel  us  to  fight 


A  DOUBTER  *S  PRAYER  57 

the  good  fight  till  life's  last  sun  is  set,  and  the 
good  that  is  in  evil  lives  is  there  to  bind  ns  still 
to  God,  and  give  us  glimpses  of  possible  redemp- 
tion.    The  poet  puts  it  simply  when  he  says : 

"I  think,  with  a  grief  half  glad, 
That  the  bad  are  as  good  as  the  good  are  bad." 

The  casual  hearer,  the  superficial  reader,  of  the 
poet's  lines  may  say,  "Does  not  the  poet  mean  to 
affirm  that  goodness  and  badness  exist  in  us  all 
in  about  the  same  measure  and  proportion?"  No, 
he  does  not  say  that  the  good  are  as  bad  as  the 
bad,  nor  does  he  say  that  the  bad  are  as  good  as 
the  good ;  he  says  that  there  is  a  little  goodness  in 
the  bad,  and  that  there  is  a  little  badness  in  the 
good.  In  the  case  of  the  good,  the  evil  is  ex- 
ceptional; in  the  case  of  the  bad  the  virtue  is  ex- 
ceptional. 

What  constitutes  the  difference  between  the  be- 
liever and  the  unbeliever,  since  they  both  doubt 
and  both  believe?  Are  they  not  therefore  in  the 
same  spiritual  order?  Think  not  so.  The  great 
fact,  the  determining  fact,  in  the  life  of  the  be- 
liever is  his  belief;  in  the  life  of  the  unbeliever  it 
is  his  doubt.  The  believer  clings  to  his  faith,  and^ 
suspects  his  doubt.  The  unbeliever  clings  to  his 
doubts  and  suspects  his  faith.  Or,  to  use  a  more\ 
familiar  comparison,  the  believer  believes  his  be- 
lief, and  doubts  his  doubt,  while  the  unbeliever  be- 
lieves his  doubt,  and  doubts  his  belief. 

The  poor  man  of  the  text,  the  man  with  a  sick 
child  (and  how  we  pity  him,  and  pity  the  child!) — 


I 


68  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

is  he  a  believer  or  an  unbeliever?  Which  does  he 
put  first,  his  faith  or  his  unfaith?  ''Lord,  I  be- 
lieve." That  is  the  first  thing  in  his  mind.  That 
counts  most.  The  other  thought  is  secondary.  So, 
he  is  a  believer,  but  he  is  a  doubting  believer.  His 
prayer  is  the  prayer  of  a  doubter,  but  he  is  a 
believing  doubter.  There  is  a  world  of  difference 
between  honest  doubt  and  stupid  or  stubborn  un- 
belief. Jesus  dealt  differently  with  the  two,  and 
jso  should  we.  ''Him  that  is  weak  in  the  faith, 
'receive  ye,  but  not  to  doubtful  disputation."  And 
again,  "Tarry  one  for  another."  Some  are  able 
to  make  more  rapid  progress  in  truth  than  others ; 
let  not  such  despise  those  who  find  it  hard  to  take 
their  first  few  steps  in  faith. 

You  know  how  it  is  in  school.  There  are  always 
some  bright,  precocious  scholars  who  leave  the 
others  far  behind.  You  know  the  contempt  with 
which  the  prize  scholar  sometimes  looks  upon  the 
"trailer."  You  know  the  impatience  of  the 
teacher  sometimes  when  a  whole  class  is  held  back 
by  one  student  who  cannot  get  over  a  hard  place  or 
see  through  an  intricate  problem.  I  do  not  know 
that  the  best  pedagogy  would  say  to  the  teacher, 
•"Tarry  for  the  slow  scholar,"  but  many  a  slow 
scholar  has  caught  up  with  his  class  because  some 
teacher,  at  vacation  time,  or  after  hours,  or  be- 
cause some  classmate,  or  fraternity  friend,  tarried 
for  him.  You  know  what  soldiers  do  on  a  long 
march.  They  tarry  for  the  weak  and  the  lame, 
except  in  the  emergency  of  approaching  battle. 
The  strong  and  vigorous  will  bear  the  arms  of 


/ 


A  doubtee's  prayee  59 

the  weak,  and  if  one  sinks  down  by  the  i*oadside, 
there  is  an  ambulance  for  him,  and  in  the  absence 
of  an  ambulance,  officers  have  been  known  to  dis- 
mount, and  repeat  the  beautiful  self-denial  of  the 
Samaritan  who  put  a  wounded  man  on  his  own 
beast  and  brought  him  to  the  inn. 

Look  at  the  Master's  treatment  of  this  doubter. 
The  man  confesses  his  faith  is  faltering.  Some- 
thing is  in  the  way  of  his  belief.  I  have  wondered 
if  it  may  not  have  been  that  barrier  to  faith  which 
all  of  us  have  stumbled  over  at  times  when  ap- 
proaching some  great  promise  of  God,  that  com- 
mon reflection,  ''It  is  too  good  to  be  true."  What-*— 
ever  it  was,  it  was  no  barrier  to  the  love  and  power 
of  Jesus,  for,  without  delay,  he  granted  the  father 's 
request,  and  spoke  the  word  that  released  and  re- 
lieved the  afflicted  child. 

Do  we  not  see  in  this  incident  much  that  is  of 
permanent  value  to  the  believer,  even  the  doubt- 
ing believer,  in  our  own  age?  Faltering  faith 
surely  honors  itself  by  frank  confession.  Doubts 
do  sometimes  loom-  large  in  the  dark,  but  assume 
far  less  alarming  proportions  when  brought  to 
the  light.  A  great-minded  and  tender-hearted 
bishop,  whose  name  is  cherished  by  us  all,  said  to 
a  mother  who  was  much  distressed  by  the  disposi- 
tion of  her  son,  a  college  student,  to  talk  skeptically, 
**Let  him  ventilate  his  notions.  Let  him  air  his 
views.  He  is  trying  to  find  out  what  he  believes, 
and  he  will  not  find  out  until  he  exposes  his  ideas 
to  the  full  light  of  day."  Another,  equally  wise,  ^ 
said  in  a  similar  instance;  "It  is  a  plain  case  of    J 


:) 


60  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

[intellectual  measles.  This  kind  of  skepticism  is  the 
rash.  It  is  best  to  let  it  come  out.  Don't  drive 
it  in." 

Faltering  faith  is  better  confessed  than  con- 
cealed. But  mark  the  wisdom  of  this  doubter, — 
he  goes  straight  to  the  Master  with  his  confession. 
How  many  knots  would  be  untangled,  how  many 
vexed  and  vexing  problems  would  be  solved  by 
going  to  the  very  central  source  of  authority !  For, 
meager  as  is  the  outline  of  our  Saviour's  teachings 
in  the  Gospels,  there  is  that  in  them  which  effect- 
ively lifts  much  of  the  world's  burden  of  doubt. 
The  rest  He  promises  to  the  laboring  and  heavy- 
/  laden  is  rest  from  perturbing  thoughts,  rest  from 
I  tormenting  uncertainties,  rest  from  harassing 
\  doubts,  as  well  as  rest  from  weariness,  and  weak- 
ness, and  wickedness.  Faltering  faith,  in  the  case 
of  this  doubter,  not  only  honors  itself  by  candid 
confession,  but  points  out  the  way  of  peace  by  the 
very  nature  of  its  expression.  The  confession  is 
a  prayer. 

The  doubter  who  makes  the  confession  of  his 
doubts  an  advertisement,  a  mere  cheap  appeal  to 
publicity,  alienates  himself,  by  that  very  act,  from 
the  spirit  of  the  truth-seeker.  It  is  as  indelicate 
to  expose  one's  doubts  in  the  market  place  as  to 
display  one's  sorrows  to  the  gaze  of  passers-by. 
"Here  is. the  golden  rule  for  all  such  souls  as  this 

If ather,  this  half-believer :  Tell  your  doubts  to  God ; 
publish  your  faith  to  your  fellow-man.  There  is 
no  place  where  doubt  so  quickly  vanishes,  where 
weak  faith  so  certainly  grows  strong,  where  lame 


A  doubter's  prayer  61 

faith  leaps,  and  blind  faith  sees,  as  at  the  Master's 
feet,  the  throne  of  Grace.  There  is  wisdom  in  the 
prayer,  ^  *  Help  thou  mine  unbelief. ' ' 

I  am  not  saying  there  are  no  others  to  help  our 
unbelief.  There  are  books  and  teachers  and  pas- 
tors and  friends  that  help  our  unbelief.  A  Cam- 
bridge professor  once  declared  that  no  student  of 
his  ever  left  the  university  without  being  per- 
manently influenced  by  the  study  of  Butler's 
*' Analogy."  Walker's  ^'Philosophy  of  the  Plan 
of  Salvation"  has  been  useful  in  dissipating  doubt 
and  stimulating  faith  in  many  a  student's  life. 
When  Phillips  Brooks  died,  a  great  company  of 
men  rose  up  to  call  him  blessed,  to  testify  that 
Avhen,  in  crises  of  their  lives,  they  went  to  him, 
they  found  light  and  leading.  If  anywhere  within 
your  reach  there  be  a  man  of  firm  faith,  a  man  like 
Tennyson's  friend  who  "fought  his  doubts  and 
gathered  strength,"  one  who  has  faced  the  specters 
of  the  mind  and  laid  them,  one  whose  faith  is  re- 
freshing and  contagious,  and  who  knows  how  to 
prove  that ' '  the  soul  has  reasons  that  Reason  cannot 
know,"  go  to  that  friend,  that  teacher,  and  say, 
''Help  thou  mine  unbelief."  Not  to  the  doubter 
to  compare  your  doubts,  or  to  confirm  them,  lest 
you  be  like  a  sick  man  who  seeks  advice  of  fellow- 
patients  in  a  hospital,  but  to  the  believer  who  has 
a  well-reasoned  creed  and  the  capacity  to  vindi- 
cate it,  to  him  go  with  the  request, ' '  Help  thou  mine 
unbelief."  But  the  skill  of  all  such  men  in  help- 
ing our  unbelief  is  feeble  compared  with  His  to 
Whom,  at  this  or  any  moment  we  may  appeal  with 


62  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

the  absolute  certainty  that  He  will  speak  the  one 
word  to  us  we  most  need  to  hear. 

He  will  speak  the  word  of  patience  to  the  soul 
whose  doubt  is  but  a  passing  phase  of  thought.  He 
will  speak  the  w^ord  of  grace  to  the  soul  whose 
doubt  is  tangled  in  some  mesh  of  trying  circum- 
stance. He  will  speak  the  word  of  peace  to  the 
soul  whose  doubt  is  but  an  echo  of  the  world's 
periodic  religious  upheaval,  or  a  reflection  of  his 
own  weariness.  He  will  speak  the  word  of  trust 
to  the  soul  whose  doubt  arises  from  an  over- 
anxiety  to  peer  into  the  mechanism  of  the  moral 
universe.  So  shall  His  power  be  with  us  in  the 
night,  and  whatsoever  doubt  vexes  our  understand- 
ing, our  hearts  shall  answer  it  with  the  assurance, 
* '  I  know  Whom  I  have  believed. ' ' 


VI 


THE    INTELLECTUAL    INFLUENCE    OF 
JESUS 


\ 


n 


x< 


v< 


"But  wherever  there  is  a  romantic  movement  in  art  there 

somehow,  and   under  some  form,   is  Christ,  or  the  soul  of 

Christ.     He  is  in  Romeo  and  Juliet,  in  the-  Winter's  Tale, 

•  in  Provencal  poetry,   in  the  Ancient  Mariner,  in  La  Belle 

Dame  sans  Merci,  and  in  Chatterton's  Ballad  of  Charity. 

"We  owe  to  Him  the  most  diverse  things  and  people. 
Hugo's  Les  Miserahles,  Baudelaire's  Fleurs  du  Mai,  the  note 
of  pity  in  Russian  novels,  Verlaine  and  Verlaine's  poems, 
the  stained  glass  and  tapestries  and  the  quattrocento  work 
of  Burne-Jones  and  Morris,  belong  to  him  no  less  than  the 
tower  of  Giotto,  Lancelot  and  Guinevere,  Tannhauser,  the 
troubled  romantic  marbles  of  Michelangelo,  pointed  archi- 
tects re,  and  the  love  of  children  and  flowers, — for  both  of 
which,  indeed,  in  classical  art  there  was  but  little  place, 
hardly  enough  for  them  to  grow  or  play  in,  but  which,  from 
the  twelfth  century  down  to  our  own  day,  have  been  con- 
tinually making  their  appearances  in  art,  under  various 
modes  and  at  various  times,  coming  fitfully  and  wilfully,  as 
children,  as  flowers,  are  apt  to  do :  spring  always  seeming 
to  one  as  if  the  flowers  had  been  in  hiding,  and  only  came 
out  into  the  sun  because  they  were  afraid  that  grown-up 
people  would  grow  tired  of  looking  for  them  and  give  up 
the  search ;  and  the  life  of  a  child  being  no  more  than  an 

I  April   day   on    which   there   is   both   rain  and  sun   for   the 

'narcissus. 

"Christianity  is  much  else,  I  know,  but,  to  the  intellect 
Christianity  is  the  reasserting  and  reestablishing  of  faith  as 
the  organ  of  knowledge  and  as  the  method  of  life.  What 
was  the  ^all  of .  man,  but  the  unreasoning  triumph  of  reason 
in  the  soul  of  man?  The  serpent  which  tempted  to  sin  was 
rationalism,  charming  but  stinging.  Man  persisted  in  eating 
of  the  tree  of  the  knowledge  of  good  and  evil.  He  would  not 
wait  iri  trust  upon  God's  knowledge.  He  must  know  for 
himself.  The  heart  was  all  loveless  and  the  will  was  power- 
less ;  but  the  reason  had  won  a  triumph ;  the  intellect  had  its 
false  supremacy." 

We   Profundis.       Oscar   Wilde.      pp.    72,    73,    74.) 


VI 

THE  INTELLECTUAL  INFLUENCE  OP  JESUS 
"The  mind    .     .     .     which  was  in  Christ  Jesus."    Phil.  ii.  5. 

The  Christian  world  well  knows  the  extent  and 
vitality  of  the  moral  and  spiritual  influence  of 
Jesus, — ^how  by  His  words  and  life  He  has  lifted 
the  world  into  a  purer  moral  and  loftier  spiritual 
atmosphere  than  it  had  ever  known  before.  The 
world  was  not  without  its  moral  teachers  before 
Jesus,  but  it  remained  for  Him  to  vitalize  the  dead  / 1 
morality  of  paganism  at  its  best,  to  put  into  right- 
eousness not  only  emotion,  as  Matthew  Arnold 
states  it,  but  principle  as  well.  The  world  had  also 
its  spiritual  leaders  before  Jesus.  The  Hebrew 
prophets  were  spiritual  geniuses.  Jesus  fulfilled 
what  they  had  dreamed,  and  completed  what  they 
began.  Buddha  lived  in  the  realm  of  the  spiritual, 
but  Jesus  taught  the  world  the  true  relation  be-  1 1 
tween  the  spiritual  and  the  material,  the  ideal  and 
the  actual. 

If  Jesus  had  done  no  more  than  this,  if  He  had 
left  His  impress  upon  the  moral  and  spiritual  life 
of  the  world.  He  would  still  be  the  world 's  greatest 
Leader,  and  humanity's  truest  Benefactor.  But 
His  intellectual  influence  has  been  as  vital  and  as 
extensive   as   His   moral   and   spiritual   influence, 

65 


66  COLLEGE    SERMONS 

and  of  that  we  do  not  hear  so  much.  Of  the  in- 
fluence of  Jesus  on  the  mental  life  of  mankind  I 
would  have  you  think.  "The  mind  .  .  .  which 
was  in  Christ  Jesus"  means  much  more  than  His 
intellect ;  it  means  His  whole  disposition,  His  emo- 
tional and  volitional  nature,  His  mental  attitude, 
and  moral  altitude;  but  it  includes  His  intellectual 
habit,  as  well,  and  so,  let  us  use  it. 

Employing  the  term,  *'the  mind  of  Christ"  in 
this  restricted  sense,  what  were  His  intellectual 
habits  ?  What  were  His  modes  of  thinking  ?  What 
characterized  His  processes  of  reasoning  and  judg- 

(ing?  Three  things  supremely.  He  saw  the  world 
as  one.  He  recognized  the  inestimable  value  of 
truth.  He  perceived  the  essential  unity  of  mental 
and  moral  truth.  And  for  one  Man,  in  that  age, 
to  stand  upon  a  platform  of  that  kind;  for  one 
Man  to  be  loyal  to  such  ideas,  was  to  stand  out 
from  all  others,  and  above  all  others,  like  Saul  of 
Israel  ''from  his  shoulders  and  upward." 

It  is  not  easy  to  estimate  the  influence  on  man's 
mental  life  of  that  one  idea,  the  world  as  one,  the 
unity  of  world-processes.  Zoroaster,  who  still 
numbers  his  adherents  by  millions,  taught  a  dual- 
ism; there  is  an  empire  of  light  and  an  empire  of 
darkness.  Paganism  taught  a  pluralism ;  there  are 
many  empires  of  authority  and  power:  one  god  of 
the  sea,  another  of  the  air,  another  of  the  earth, 
and  another  of  the  winds ;  one  god  of  love  (that  is, 
animal  love)  and  another  of  war,  and  another  of  the 
harvest,  and  another  of  the  chase.  Here  and  there 
were  men  like  Plato,  who  saw  the  unreason  and  the 


THE   INTELLECTUAL   INFLUENCE    OF   JESUS         67 

mischief  of  such  a  conception  of  world-processes, 
but  none  saw  it  so  clearly,  or  proclaimed  it  so  in- 
dubitably as  Jesus,  so  that  from  the  beginning  of 
His  Gospel  until  now,  His  conception  of  the  unity 
of  God  and  the  harmony  of  cosmic  forces  has 
cleared  the  mental  atmosphere,  and  made  possible 
sane  thinking  with  reference  to  first  causes  and 
natural  phenomena  and  the  universal  reign  of 
law. 

Aristotle  is  sometimes  spoken  of  as  the  father 
of  the  scientific  method  of  observing  facts  and 
drawing  conclusions;  but  he  was  a  pupil  of  Plato, 
and  Plato  came  nearest  to  Jesus  in  his  idea  of  the 
world's  unity.  Francis  Bacon,  more  than  any 
other  modern  man,  gave  us  the  modern  scientific 
method,  perfecting  that  which  Aristotle  began. 
But  Francis  Bacon  looked  to  Jesus  as  his  Master, 
and  was  not  forgetful  of  his  debt,  and  of  the 
world's  debt,  to  that  Galilean  Teacher  who  swept 
all  the  pagan  gods  and  notions  of  intermediary 
deities  off  the  field  of  man's  mental  vision. 

The  work  of  Jesus  in  this  respect,  was  like  the 
work  of  a  man  who  plants  the  powder  blast  in  a 
quarry.  Others  build  out  of  material  which  he 
dislodges.  It  was  like  the  work  of  the  pioneers, 
who  cleared  the  forests  for  generations  that  later 
built  palaces.  He  was  a  great  Pathfinder. for  mul- 
titudes of  thinkers,  not  all  of  whom  are  well  aware 
of  their  intellectual  indebtedness  to  Him. 

It  is  more  easily  demonstrable  that  Jesus'  em- 
phasis on  the  superlative  value  of  truth  has  had 
unmeasured  influence  on  the  intellect  of  the  world. 


68  COLLEGE    SERMONS 

No  other  teacher  has  ever  made  so  much  of  truth. 
Some  have  made  more  of  facts.  Jesus  never  dog- 
matized about  facts,  just  because  He  knew  how 
much  more  important  truth  is  than  mere  facts. 
The  historian  is  anxious  to  collect  and  classify  facts. 
The  philosopher  cares  little  for  facts  save  as  they 
point  to  truth.  Truths  explain  facts.  A  thousand 
people  may  be  trusted  to  collect  facts  to  one  who 
may  be  trusted  to  recognize  truth  when  he  sees  it. 

Jesus  said,  "I  am  the  Truth."  Here  is  an 
affirmation  of  the  revelatory_.p(2wer  of  personality, 
w^hich  the  psj^chologists  of  the  world  are  just  be- 
ginning to  recognize.  Moreover,  it  is  an  affirma- 
tion of  a  principle  that  theologians  have  not  al- 
ways appreciated,  that  Christianity  is,  in  its  be- 
ginning, as  in  its  finality,  attachment  to  a  Person. 

Jesus  said,  ''Ye  shall  know  the  truth,  and  the 
I  truth  shall  make  you  free. ' '  It  was  as  if  Jesus 
foresaw  the  age-long  struggle  of  the  world  for  free- 
dom. Now  all  freedom  is  from  one  root, — political 
freedom,  social  freedom,  religious  freedom,  indus- 
trial freedom,  it  is  all  the  fruit  of  one  plant,  and 
that  plant  has  its  root  in  the  freedom  of  the  spirit. 
Herein  Jesus  proved  Himself  the  world's  farthest- 
sighted  Reformer.  He  knew  what  revolutions, 
what  new  adjustments,  what  new  creations  would 
follow  the  freedom  of  the  spirit.  So  He  uttered  a 
single  sentence,  a  simple  pronouncement  that  all 
freedom  has  its  source  in  the  inner  life  of  man,  and 
lo !  all  things  begin  to  be  made  new.  It  is  not 
strange  that  President  Eliot  of  Harvard  selected 
these  words  to  be  inscribed  upon  the  walls  of  the 


THE   INTELLECTUAL   INFLUENCE   OF   JESUS         69 

Congressional  Library  at  Washington.     They  are  \ 

the  magna  charta  of  the  human  mind.     Where  else 

is  such  encouragement  to  the  spirit  of  research  and 

discovery?     Where  else  is  such  a  commission  to 

read  all  the  leaves  of  God's  Book,  His  Book  above      *    ^ll'l 

us,  in  the  starry  sky,  His  Book  beneath  us,  in  the  I  \  VV 

rock-ribbed  earth.  His  Book  within  us,  and  His/  „ 

Book  before  us,  the  Holy  Scriptures  of  our  faith? 

Pastor  Robinson  told  the  Pilgrims,  *'New  truths 

are  yet  to  burst  upon  us  from  this  Book."     Noble 

words,  but  they  are  only  an  echo, — the  voice  comes 

to  us  out  of  Galilee. 

Hospitality  to  all  truth,  vast  tolerance  of  the 
mind,  the  catholic  spirit  of  the  man  who  said,  ''I 
am  willing  to  sit  at  the  feet  of  anyone,  however 
humble  he  may  be,  if  only  he  will  teach  me  truth, ' ' 
— all  this  is  in  the  train  of  Jesus'  high  appraisal 
of  truth. 

But  these  two  mental  traits  of  Jesus,  His  con- 
ception of  the  world  as  one,  and  His  knowledge  of 
the  supreme  worth  of  truth,  are  less  exclusively 
His,  are  more  characteristic  of  some  other  great 
teachers,  such  as  Plato,  than  is  the  third.  I  refer 
to  His  perception  of  the  essential  unity  of  mental 
and  moral  truth. 

The  vice  of  ancient  philosophy,  and  of  much 
modern  thinking,  is  that  it  suffers  a  divorce  of 
mental  and  moral  sincerity.  An  Apostle  speaks  of 
those  who  are  * '  ever  learning:,  and  never^  able  to 
come  to  the  knowledge  of  the  truth. ' '  Such  people 
are  like  a  hunter  who  kills  ^me,  and  lets  it  lie 
where  it  falls.    He  is  out  for  the  fun  of  shooting. 


70  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

The  noblest  game  on  our  western  plains  was  ex- 
terminated by  that  method.     Or,  to  use  another 
figure,  there  is  a  method  of  seeking  truth  not  unlike 
that  of  the  coquette  who  captures  hearts  merely 
/for  the  sensation  of  conquest.     The  search  for  truth 
,        -^-  ^  I  is  worth  nothing  if,  when  we  arrive  at  truth,  we 
L  y    ^1  are  unwilling  to  adopt  it,  even  though  it  be  of  the 
^*'         character  of  a  moral  imperative.     As  well  kill  game 
^^w  for  the  mere  sake  of  killing;  as  well  win  hearts  for 

^  the  mere  sake  of  the  sense  of  victory;  as  well  cook 

a  meal  and  leave  it  uneaten ;  as  well  discover  a 
mine  and  never  work  it;  as  well  paint  a  picture 
and  turn  it  to  the  wall;  or  build  a  mansion  and 
board  it  up,  as  to  seek  the  truth  and  then  turn  from 
it  when  we  find  it  demands  the  heroism  of  sur- 
render, the  humiliation  of  confession,  or  the  sacri- 
fice of  service. 

Multitudes  have  studied  the  personality  of  Jesus 
Christ,  and  even  when  they  have  been  satisfied  that 
He  is  the  Saviour  of  souls,  have  been  unwilling  to 
pay  the  price  -of  discipleship.  They  lack  moral 
sincerity.  And  other  multitudes  have  failed  to  see 
in  Jesus  Christ  all  that  He  really  is,  simply  because 
they  approached  the  study  of  His  character  with- 
out that  quality  of  moral  candor,  suggested  by  His 
own  words,  ''If  any  man  will  do  .  .  .  shall 
know."  No  man  can  see  in  Jesus  Christ  all  that 
He  is  who  does  not  bring  to  that  study  the  willing- 
ness to  do  His  will,  if  it  be  clear  that  His  will  is 
coincident  with  the  will  of  God. 

There  is  an  impressive  passage  in  one  of  Sidney 
Lanier's  lectures  to  the  students  at  Johns  Hopkins 


;  I 

\ 


THE   INTELLECTUAL   INFLUENCE   OF   JESUS         71 

University,  in  which  he  says ;  ' '  He  who  has  not  yel\ 
perceived  how  moral  and  artistic  beauty  are  con- 
vergent lines  which  run  back  into  a  common  ideal 
origin,  he  who  has  not  come  to  that  stage  in 
which  the  beauty  of  holiness  and  the  holiness  of 
beauty  burn  as  one  fire,  shine  as  one  light  within 
him,  he  is  not  yet  the  great  artist."  Was  it  not 
Aristotle  who  taught  the  doctrine  that  the  per-\ 
ception  of  truth  is  essentially  a  moral  act  ?  Certain 
it  is  that  this  is  implied  in  Jesus'  words,  **If  any 
man  will  do  His  will,  he  shall  know  of  the  doc- 
trine."  Frederick  W.  Robertson  gives  us  a  sig- 
nificant phrase,  * '  Obedience,  the  condition  of  | 
knowledge."  Noah  Porter,  once  President  of  Yale, 
uses  a  similar  expression  in  one  of  his  baccalaureate 
sermons.  This  is  what  I  mean  when  I  speak  of  the 
unity  of  mental  and  moral  truth. 

I  have  a  friend  who  sat  down  one  day  and 
counted  the  words  of  Jesus  recorded  in  the  four 
Gospels.  He  was  amazed  to  find  how  few  they 
are.  They  could  all  be  printed  on  one  page  of  a 
modern  newspaper.  Yet  those  words  are  the 
classics  of  the  religious  world.  "What  volumes  of 
literature,  what  galleries  of  art,  what  wealth  of 
speech,  what  folios  of  song,  have  flowed  out  from 
that  little  ''lake  of  dreams"!  More  than  all  that, 
what  heroic  endeavors  to  find  the  truth,  to  learn 
the  truth  by  living  it,  to  mould  the  truth  into  the 
body  of  life,  to  weave  it  into  the  fabric  of  character 
His  words  have  inspired ! 

Hugh  McMillan  says  that  the  two  most  signifi- 
cant moments  in  the  history  of  modern  learning 


72 


COLLEGE   SEKMONS 


\// 


were,  one,  when  Galileo  first  saw  the  greatness  of 
the  universe,  the  other,  when  Buffon,  examining  a 
pile  of  fossil  bones,  perceived  that  they  were  of  ani- 
mals hitherto  unknown,  and  at  once  concluded  that 
the  natural  history  of  the  world  must  be  lengthened 
by  many  ages.  Those  two  moments  marked  im- 
measurable growth  for  the  human  mind.  There 
have  been  many  such  moments, — moments  of  dis- 
covery, which  have  enlarged  the  boundaries  of 
human  knowledge.  Men  who  make  such  discover- 
ies, arrive  at  such  conclusions,  are  stars  in  the  sky 
of  learning.  But  there  is  a  Sun  in  that  sky.  He 
Who  first  saw  the  world  as  one,  Who  first  taught 
hat  truth  is  to  be  valued  above  all  things  else, 
and  Who  made  plain  that  the  only  way  to  possess 
truth  is  to  translate  it  into  character, — shall  we  not 
call  Him  "the  sovereign  Seer  of  time"?     *'The 


mind 


which  was   in   Christ  Jesus"   was 


creative  in  the  highest  sense,  and  His  mind  in  us 
lifts  us  to  higher  levels  of  thinking,  as  well  as  of 
living  and  loving. 


VII 
THE  INSPIRATION  OF  THE  PROPHET 


"Slowly  but  inevitably  we  are  moving  to  this  great 
thought.  It  is  summed  up  in  one  word :  Redemption,  The 
watchword  of  a  century  ago  was  gravitation.  It  explained 
the  poise  of  the  universe  by  a  great  and  hitherto  undis- 
covered law.  The  watchword  of  yesterday  was  evolution. 
It  explains  progressive  change :  the  mounting-up  of  life 
'through  spires  of  form.'  The  forms  of  the  universe  are 
seen  in  a  series  which  is  in  the  main  ascendant,  and  in 
which  the  survivor  is  supreme.  The  watchword  of  to-mor- 
row is  Redemption.  The  thinker  will  some  day  live,  who 
will  make  that  great  word  Redemption  stand  out  in  all  its 
vast  mystery  and  significance.  This,  I  take  it,  is  the  work 
of  our  new  century. 

"Redemption  is  the  explanation  of  the  existence  of  man, 
of  his  present  progress,  and  his  future  destiny.  It  is  the 
great  mystery  of  joy  in  which  the  race  partakes ;  the  spir- 
itual culmination  of  all  things  earthly ;  the  forecast  of 
eternal  things  yet  to  be. 

"Redemption  is  not  a  dogma ;  it  is  a  life.  Redemption  is 
a  perpetual  and  ascendant  moral  growth.  It  marks  a 
world-balm,  a  world-change.  It  is  in  the  spirit  of  man  that 
it  works,  and  not  in  his  outer  condition,  or  external  striv- 
ings.    It  is  ultimately  to  root  sin  out  of  the  world. 

"Through  stormy  sorrows  and  perpetual  desolations  comes 
the  race  to  God.  2^n  is  the  whole  of  things — the  encom- 
passment  of  space,  and  time,  and  endless  years, — an  en- 
vironment of  immortality  and  peace." 

{The    Warriors.     Anna   Robertson    Brown   Lindsay,     pp.   163,164.) 


VII 

THE  INSPIRATION  OF   THE  PROPHET 

"In  the  year  that  king  Uzziah  died  I  saw  also  the  Lord 
sitting  upon  a  throne,  high  and  lifted  up,  and  his  train 
filled  the  temple. 

"Above  it  stood  the  seraphim :  each  one  had  six  wings ; 
with  twain  he  covered  his  face,  and  with  twain  he  covered 
his  feet,  and  with  twain  he  did  fly. 

"And  one  cried  unto  another,  and  said,  Holy,  holy,  holy, 
is  the  Lord  of  hosts :  the  earth  is  full  of  his  glory. 

"And  the  posts  of  the  door  moved  at  the  voice  of  him  that 
cried,  and  the  house  was  filled  with  smoke. 

"Then  said  I,  Woe  is  me !  for  I  am  undone ;  because  I  am 
a  man  of  unclean  lips,  and  I  dwell  in  the  midst  of  a 
people  of  unclean  lips :  for  mine  eyes  have  seen  the  King, 
the  Lord  of  hosts. 

"Then  flew  one  of  the  seraphim  unto  me,  having  a  live 
coal  in  his  hand,  which  he  had  taken  with  the  tongs  from 
off  the  altar : 

"And  he  laid  it  upon  my  mouth,  and  said,  Lo,  this  hath 
touched  thy  lips ;  and  thine  iniquity  is  taken  away,  and 
thy  sin  purged. 

"Also  I  heard  the  voice  of  the  Lord,  saying.  Whom  shall  I 
send,  and  who  will  go  for  us?  Then  said  I,  Here  am  I; 
send   me."     Isa.   vi.    1-8. 

There  were  reformers  before  the  Reformation. 
Such  were  Wyeliffe,  and  Huss,  and  Savonarola. 

There  were  Christians  before  Christ.  Abraham, 
Moses,  David,  and  Isaiah  must  be  numbered  among 
them.  They  looked  forward  toward  Christ,  in 
hope,-  even  as  we  look  backward  to  Him,  in  faith. 

75 


76  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

Of  all  the  Christians  before  Christ,  Isaiah  seems 
to  have  the  most  Christlike  vision  of  the  world  as 
the  subject  of  redemption.  He  has  much  of  the 
spirituality  of  John,  and  much  of  the  mental  vigor 
of  Paul.  He  saw  the  New  Jerusalem  in  the  midst 
of  the  old.  He  heard  heavenly  harmonies  above 
earthly  discords.  He  sought  to  make  a  new  earth 
wherein  dwelt  righteousness. 

The  verses  I  have  read  tell  us  whence  Isaiah  de- 
,  rived  his  inspiration.     He  saw  God.     No  man  can 
/  be  a  prophet  until  he  has  that  vision.     We  are  not 
prepared  to  see  man,  or  sin,  or  duty,  or  death,  or 
destiny,  until  first  we  have  seen   God.     What  I 
,  mean  is  this :  a  clear  apprehension  of  God  is  neces- 
I  sary  to  the  understanding  of  any  problem  involv- 
ing moral  law.    A  right  view  of  Grod  is  as  the 
\base  line  to  the  builder,  the  ground  tone  to  the  art- 
ist, the  ke;^Tiote  to  the  musician. 

Isaiah's  hour  of  inspiration  was  the  hour  of  his 
vision  of  God.  The  supreme  hour  of  any  life,  the 
very  pearl  of  hours,  is  when  God  is  thought  of  as 
He  is.  It  may  be  we  have  imagined  Him  as  a 
great  King,  seated  on  His  throne  of  power,  hurl- 
ing thunderbolts  at  His  foes;  or  we  have  pictured 
Him  a  stern  Judge,  with  an  instrument  of  ven- 
geance in  His  hands,  ready  to  strike  through 
''with  prongs  of  pain''  the  luckless  sinner  that 
stands  .before  Him;  or,  we  have  thought  of  Him 
as  an  impersonal  Power,  an  impenetrable  Mys- 
tery, a  Stream  of  Tendency,  or  an  Infinite  Un- 
known. Well,  when  one  who  has  held  such  a  view 
of  God  sees  Him  as  He  is, — the  God  who  is  better 


THE   INSPIKATION    OF   THE   PROPHET  77 

than  our  best  thoughts  of  Him  can  be,  more  pa- 
tient than  any  teacher,  more  pitiful  than  any 
father,  more  comforting  than  any  mother, — that 
is  the  day  of  his  heavenly  vision,  the  very  birth- 
day of  his  hope. 

Isaiah  says,  ''I  saw."  Is  it,  then,  given  to  man 
to  be  so  sure  of  spiritual  phenomena?  So  it  seems 
from  this  Book.  The  basis  of  this  confidence  is  in 
the  spiritual  consciousness  out  of  which  Moses 
spoke  when  he  said,  ''I  saw  the  passing  pageant  1/ 
of  the  goodness  of  the  Lord;"  out  of  which  Paul^ 
spoke  when  he  said,  ''I  saw  a  light  above  the 
brightness  of  the  sun,  and  heard  a  voice  out  of  the 
radiance  calling  me  by  name;"  out  of  which  John 
spoke  when  he  said,  "In  the  midst  of  the  golden 
candlesticks  I  saw  One  like  unto  the  Son  of  Man, 
girt  with  a  golden  girdle,  and  holding  the  seven 
stars  in  his  hand."  Not  more  real  was  the  moun- 
tain whereon  Moses  stood,  or  the  splendid  highway 
over  which  Paul  was  traveling,  or  the  rocks  of 
Patmos  whereon  the  waves  broke  into  spray, — not 
more  real  were  these  than  the  visions  unfolded  to 
human  spirits  there. 

The  definiteness  of  the  prophet's  memory  is 
startling, — in  the  death-year  of  King  Uzziah. 
Plappy  the  man  who  keeps  a  journal  and  records 
the  date  of  this  and  that  event.  I  know  one  who  is 
able  to  say:  *'It  was  on  the  19th  of  March,  1886, 
I  began  to  be  led  by  the  Spirit. ' '  But  others  there 
are  who  must  say ;  "I  do  not  know  just  when  I  en- 
tered the  new  life.  I  think  it  was  some  time  be- 
tween   sixteen    and    twenty    years    of    age.     The 


78  COLLEGE    SERMONS 

change  came  so  gradually  that  I  glided  into  the 
consciousness  of  a  definite  relationship  to  God  as 
a  ship  glides  out  of  a  region  of  ice  into  a  warmer 
zone."  God  does  not  deal  with  us  all  alike. 
There  are  flowers  that  burst  into  bloom,  and  there 
are  others  that  gradually  unfold.  Let. not  the 
man  with  the  calendar  say  to  the  man  who  develops 
faith  more  slowly,  ''You  are  not  a  Christian." 
And  let  not  the  man  whose  conversion  was  a  pro- 
cess rather  than  a  single  act,  despise  the  testimony 
of  him  who  said,  *'I  remember  the  day,  the  hour, 
the  spot  where  Love  Divine  first  found  me." 

There  are  those  who  covet  certain  definite  data 
of  religious  life,  who  must  content  themselves  with 
.general,  rather  than  particular  experiences.     You 
(do  not  remember  the  day,  or  even  the  year,  when 
I  you  first  became  conscious  of  self;  you  do  not  re- 
unember  the  day,  or  even  the  year,  when  you  left 
Jihildhood  behind  you,  and  became  a  man.     But, 
if  you  are  a  man,  if  you  are  bearing  burdens  that 
only  men  can  bear,  thinking  a  man's  thoughts,  doing 
a  man's  work,  the  definite  memory  of  manhood's 
beginning  may  well  be  ignored.     The  fact  that  one 
has  reached  the  slope  or  summit  of  a  mountain,  is 
proof  that  he  began  the  ascent  sometime,   some- 
where.    Are   you   pure   in   heart,   poor  in   spirit, 
meek,  mournful  over  sin,  a  lover  of  peace?     Then 
somewhere,  along  the  path  your  feet  have  trod, 
you  caught  a  glimpse  of  the  Eternal,  you  spoke  to 
the  Infinite,  and  heard  His  voice,  and  the  process 
of  your  transfiguration  began,  which  shall  not  end 


THE   INSPIKATION    OF    THE    PEOPHET  79 

until  you  pass  through  the  gates  that  open  in- 
wardly to  the  temple  of  all  truth. 

Manifold  was  the  effect  of  Isaiah's  vision. 
First,  he  became  keenly  conscious  of  his  own  defi- 
ciency: ''I  am  a  man  of  unclean  lips."  The  in- 
evitable effect  of  the  vision  of  God,  is  a  deeper 
knowledge  of  our  own  need.  It  may  be  difficult  to 
determine  whether  a  picture  is  a  copy  of  a  master- 
piece, or  the  masterpiece  itself,  but  put  it  beside 
the  original,  and  all  the  imperfections  and  im- 
maturity of  the  copy  are  obvious.  Here  is  a  sheet 
of  paper  called  pure  white.  But  when,  by  the  aid 
of  scientific  instruments,  you  produce  a  pure  white 
light,  this  paper  appears  an  ashen  gray,  or  a  faded 
yellow.  It  cannot  stand  the  vision  of  pure  white. 
The  humblest  souls  on  earth,  the  most  ready  to  con- 
fess their  faults,  are  those  who  have  the  clearest 
vision  of  God.  In  His  light  we  see  not  only  light 
but  darkness.  The  very  thought  of  God  awakens 
in  us  a  sense  of  sin. 

There  are  some  who  delay  their  first  step  in 
Christian  living  b6cause  they  have  never  felt  the 
weight  of  sin.  They  look  for  '* conviction,"  long 
for  it,  even  pray  for  it.  But  how  quickly  it  fol- 
lows the  sight  of  God!  Let  them  pray  for  that; 
let  them  pray  for  the  vision  of  Jesus  Christ. 

Another  result  of  the  vision  is  quietness  and  as- 
surance. There  is  nothing  a  prophet  more  needs 
than  a  calm  outlook  into  the  future,  the  little  fu- 
ture of  these  years  of  our  lives,  and  the  greater  fu- 
ture of  the  centuries.     No  one  of  us  is  well  quali- 


80  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

fied  to  be  a  soldier  in  the  ranks  of  the  army  of  re- 
form until  he  sees  that,  whatever  happens,  God  is 
on  the  throne.  There  are  many  disquieting  sights, 
many  disquieting  thoughts.  In  vain  the  psalmist 
admonishes  us,  '*Fret  not  thyself  because  of  evil 
doers.''  We  do  fret  ourselves  when  wickedness 
flourishes^  and  vice  runs  riot  and  appears  to  be  im- 
mune from  penalty.  We  do  fret  ourselves  when 
falsehood  flaunts  her  banner  in  the  face  of  truth. 
We  are  cast  down  when  we  see  how  full  the  world 
is  of  frauds,  and  shams,  and  snares,  and  traps  for 
men,  and  wrecks  of  men.  Superficially,  the  race 
seems  to  be  a  failure,  the  world  a  sad  experiment. 
There  are  not  wanting  those  who  are  ready  to  de- 
clare modern  civilization  only  a  thin  veneer,  and 
Christianity  itself  impotent  to  create  a  new  order 
of  things.  There  are  not  wanting  those  who  proph- 
esy the  ultimate  and  even  speedily  approaching 
end  of  the  present  social  and  industrial  systems, 
in  bloodshed  and  universal  violence.  But  he  who 
sees  what  Isaiah  saw  has  no  such  troubled  dream. 
God  on  the  throne  is  the  pledge  that  good  shall  be 
the  final  goal  of  ill.  God  on  the  throne  means  that 
He  will  make  the  wrath  of  man  to  praise  Him  and 
restrain  the  remainder.  God  on  the  throne  means 
that  out  of  w^hat  seems  remediless  confusion  per- 
fect order  and  beauty  are  to  come.  God  on  the 
throne  •  means,  not  merely  ''moonlight  on  a 
troubled  sea,"  but  the  calming  of  the  sea.  God  on 
the  throne  means  all  things  working  together  to 
accomplish  His  good  will. 
We  are  like  children  in  a  machine  shop,  who  see 


THE   INSPIRATION    OF   THE   PROPHET  81 

this  wheel  revolving  one  way,  and  that  wheel  re-\ 
volving  another  way,  this  wheel  revolving  rapidly,  \ 
and  that  wheel  revolving  slowly,  and  who  conclude 
that  therefore  there  is  no  plan,  no  unifying  force  / 
about  it  all.  Or,  to  use  another  figure,  we  stand 
by  a  great  loom,  and  see  one  side  of  the  fabric,  and 
it  seems  to  be  a  crazy  patchwork  of  shapes  and 
colors.  Isaiah  caught  a  glimpse  of  the  Engineer 
and  saw  that  He  was  master  of  all  the  wheels  and 
belts  and  pulleys.  Isaiah  caught  a  glimpse  of  the 
Weaver  at  the  loom  and  saw  that  the  pattern  was 
before  Him  all  the  while.  So,  ever  afterward, 
whoever  was  on  the  throne  of  Judah,  whoever  ruled 
Israel,  there  was  one  man  absolutely  calm  and  con- 
fident, knowing  that  the  King  of  kings  was  on  the 
Great  Throne,  and  that  all  earthly  monarchs  are 
but  His  puppets,  with  paper  crowns  and  scepters 
of  straw.  He  was  like  Robert  Browning's  man, 
who  ''never  dreamed  though  right  were  worsted, 
wrong  would  triumph."  ''What  is  your  carpen- 
ter doing  now?"  said  a  Roman  scoffer  to  an  early 
Christian.  "He  is  making  a  cofQn  for  your  em- 
peror," was  the  reply.  And  He  was.  Nero  is  but 
a  noxious  memory.  We  name  our  dogs  Nero. 
The  Carpenter  of  Nazareth  is  on  the  throne  of , 
power,  ' '  Ancient  of  days  yet  ever  new. ' ' 

The  vision  of  God  revealed  to  Isaiah  his  need 
of  cleansing,  made  him  long  for  holiness,  and  that 
.moment  he  was  holy.  In  Maurice  Hewlett 's  ' '  For- 
est Lovers, ' '  there  is  a  girl  who,  though  born  of  no- 
ble blood,  has  been  reared  amidst  squalor.  When 
Prosper,   the   clean-mouthed   and   summer-hearted 


1 


82  COLLEGE    SERMONS 

knight  takes  her  from  her  hut  to  save  her  from 
death,  he  says,  **Isoult,  what  is  it  you  want?" 
And  she  answers,  **I  want  to  be  what  I  have  never 
\been."    ''What  then  is  that?"     ''To  be  clean." 
1  The   prodigal  wanted   a  new  robe   before   he  sat 
/  down   at   his   father's   table.     The    old.  robe   was 
soiled  and  worn.     Jesus  spoke  a  parable  of  a  man 
who  made  a  feast,  and  required  that  those  who  sat 
with  him  should  have  appropriate  raiment.     What 
does  that  represent, — the  white  robe,  the  wedding 
garment?     Cleansing.     All   the    ablutions    of    the 
Old  Testament  ceremonials  and  all  the  baptisms  of 
the  New,  the  baptism  of  water  and  the  baptism  of 
fire,  are  designed  to  teach  the  Divine  beauty  and 
/the  human  necessity  of  holiness.     If  it  took  fire 
/  to  purify  the  lips  of  the  young  Hebrew  prophet, 
Vnothing  less  than  fire  will  avail  for  us.     To  this 
end  came  the  Holy  Spirit,  at  Pentecost,  His  sym- 
bol lambent  tongues  of  flame.     To  this  end  God's 
■*  eternal  Spirit  is  in  the  world  to-day,  ready  to  visit 
us  who  say,  . 

"Refining  Fire,  go  through  my  heart, 
Illuminate  my  soul." 

Swiftly  the  angel  was  sent  to  touch  the  lips  that 

f cried  for  cleansing,  and  alwa3^s  swiftly  pardon 
follows  penitence,  and  peace  accompanies  pardon. 
Do  we  know  this — that  the  desire  for  purity  is 
^itself  purifjang?  He  who  desires  God  has  God. 
He  who  hungers  and  thirsts  after  righteousness  is 
filled.  It  is  only  the  Divine  within  the  heart  that 
can  make  us  feel  the  need  of  Christ.     "No  man 


THE   INSPIRATION    OF   THE   PROPHET  83 

can  call  Jesus  Lord  except  by  the  Holy  Spirit."  ^ 
When  we  understand  this,   innumerable   barriers 
fall,    innumerable    obstacles    disappear,    innumer- 
able objections  vanish  into  thin  air, — when  it  is 
understood  that  the  first  faint  desire  for  God  is  I 
itself  a  step  toward  God. 

There  is  yet  another  sequel  to  the  vision.     This 
was  the  end  of  it  all, — ''Who  will  go  for  us?" 
The  value  of  the  vision  was  not  to  the  prophet 
alone,  but  to  Judah  and  Jerusalem  immediately, 
and  to  all  the  race  ultimately.     He  who  sees  God 
hears  Him  also,  and  the  voice  that  says,  "Come 
and  see,"  says,  "Go  and  tell."     The  fatal  weak- 
ness of  much  of  our  religion  is  that  it  is  regarded 
as  an  end  in  itself.     No  soul  is  saved  for  its  own  — 
sake.     No  soul  is  truly  saved  until  it  becomes,  in] 
some  sense,  a  saviour  to  other  souls.     Light  is  notu 
light  until  it  impinges  on  some  material  substance.  H 
The  interstellar  spaces  are  black  because  they  con- // 
tain  nothing  for  light  to  touch  and  transfigure. 
The  saving  grace  of  God  is  not  manifest  until  the  \ 
soul  that  was  comforted  comforts  others  with  the  / 
comfort  wherewith  it  was  comforted  of  God. 

The  sun  does  not  shine  for  itself;  stars  do  not 
beam,  nor  flowers  bloom,  nor  birds  sing,  for  them- 
selves. We  do  not  light  a  candle  for  the  candle's) 
sake,  but  that  it  may  illumine  the  room.  Our 
spirits  are  the  candles  of  the  Almighty,  and,  to 
carry  the  figure  farther,  we  give  light  only  as  we  i 
are  consumed.  A  psalmist  says, ' '  The  zeal  of  thine 
house. hath  eaten  me  up,"  and  such  is  the  tes- 
timony  of  many   another  life   of   faith.     I   have 


84  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

been  thinking  of  such  a  life,  a  woman  into  whose 
home  there  came,  long  years  ago,  a  sorrow  that  was 
absolutely  appalling.  Her  youngest  child,  the 
darling  of  her  heart,  was  stolen  away,  kidnapped, 
and  the  world  well  knows  that  little  boy's  name. 
In  the  hour  of  her  great  grief,  she  saw  the  throne  of 
God  spanning  like  a  bridge  of  gold  her  gulf  of  woe, 
and  she  w^as  comforted.  Then  she  heard  the  voice 
of  duty  calling,  **"Who  will  go  for  us?"  and  she 
said,  "Here  am  I;  send  me."  So,  every  Sunday 
morning  for  twenty-five  years,  through  summer 
heat  and  winter  storm,  she  has  gone  to  the  house 
of  God  at  half-past  nine  to  teach  a  class  of  chil- 
dren in  the  Master's  name.  Many  another  there 
is,  in  whose  life  noble  service  followed  the  vision 
*of  the  Eternal.  One  is  a  missionary  among  the 
Arabs  on  the  border  of  the  Great  Desert.  One  is 
a  settlement  worker  in  the  slums  of  a  great  city. 
One  is  a  teacher  of  boys  in  a  private  school,  and 
he  thinks  more  of  doing  well  his  work,  of  develop- 
ing fine  character  in  his  scholars,  than  he  does  of 
drawing  his  salary.  One  is  a  child  who  has  never 
spoken  an  unkind  word  since  a  certain  day  when, 
after  a  storm  of  passion,  he  was  led  to  see  his  weak- 
ness and  to  pray  for  inward  strength.  The  Lamb- 
hood  of  God  has  made  him  gentle. 

Another  is  a  business  man,  the  rule  of  whose  life 

(is  to  mark  every  day,  to  make  it  memorable,  by  a 
work  of  mercy  and  help.  I  have  known  him,  late 
at  night,  to  go  out  upon  the  street,  seeking  an  op- 
portunity for  humane  service,  because  the  day  had 
been  too  crowded  to  permit  his  fulfillment  of  a  vow 


THE   INSPIRATION    OF   THE   PROPHET  85 

to  close  the  record  of  no  day  without  a  message 
given  or  a  ministry  performed  in  the  spirit  of 
Jesus  Christ.  Still  another  is  a  woman  who  re- 
veals almost  incredible  patience  in  dealing  with 
her  family  of  riotous  and  fretful  children.  All 
these,  and  others  like  them,  are  in  the  succession  of 
prophets  and  apostles,  servants  of  the  Most  High, 
— servants  whom  their  Lord  admits  to  friendship 
with  Himself.  ' '  Ye  are  My  friends,  if  you  do  what-  ) 
soever  I  command  you."  * 


VIII 
CHRISTIAN  CERTAINTIES 


"A  second  way  of  ascertaining  the  nature  of  the  Word 
of  God  is  to  consult  every  variety  of  Christian  experience. 
Let  testimony  be  sought  from  rich  and  poor,  from  the 
densely  ignorant  as  well  as  from  the  highly  en^lightened, 
from  men  of  affairs,  from  poets  and  philosophers  and 
scientists,  from  those  who  have  been  rescued  out  of  gross 
degradation  and  from  those  who  have  never  known  any  other 
than  the  Christian  life ;  in  all  these  persons  alike,  with  or 
without  historical  knowledge  or  a  critical  theory  of  the  facts 
of  the  New  Testament,  with  or  without  a  philosophy  or  a 
theology,  not  seldom  with  irrational  notions  as  to  the  great 
outstanding  features  of  Christian  belief,  .there  has  been 
created  a  new  and  higher,  a  supernatural,  Divine  con- 
sciousness." 

^Realities  of  Christian  Theology.  Clarence  Augustine  Beckwith. 
pp.    324,   325.) 

"It  would  be  incredible,  if  it  were  not  true,  that  we  still 
have  assailants  and  critics  of  Christianity  in  our  midst  for 
whom  the  religious  consciousness  simply  does  not  exist ;  they 
discuss  what  they  think  the  claims  of  Christianity  and  pro- 
nounce judgment  against  it,  but  the  chief  witness  is  never 
called.  Such  grotesque  travesties  of  justice  ought  in  the 
future  to  be  laughed  out  of  court.  Happily  there  are  signs 
of  the  coming  of  a  better  day.  It  is  good  to  be  told  by  a 
competent  authority  that  'the  natural  history  of  the  re- 
ligious consciousness  as  it  manifests  itself  in  the  life  of  the 
individual  has  now  taken  its  place  among  the  sciences.' " 

iAncient    Faith    and    Modern    Doubt.     Professor    W.    R.    Inge.) 


VIII 

CHRISTIAN   CERTAINTIES 

"One  thing  I  know,  that,  whereas  I  was  blind,  now  I 
see."     John    ix.   25. 

Blindness  is  one  of  the  commonest  afflictions  in 
Egypt  and  Palestine.  It  has  been  so  from  time 
immemorial.  There  are  various  reasons  why  it  is 
so.  A  distinguished  oculist,  impressed  by  the 
multitude  of  people  in  those  countries  who  suffer 
from  diseases  of  the  eye,  of  one  kind  and  another, 
gives  it  as  his  opinion  that  a  liberal  use  of  soap 
for  a  single  generation  would  reduce  the  number 
of  blind  by  one  half,  and  that  the  application  of 
very  simple  remedies  would  reduce  the  number  of 
the  remainder  by  two  thirds. 

Blindness  and  leprosy  are  the  two  most  fre- 
quently mentioned  ailments  in  the  Scriptures. 
Some  of  Jesus  ^  most  wonderful  miracles  were 
wrought  upon  blind  men  and  lepers.  It  must  have 
been  so  in  the  nature  of  things,  for  His  miracles 
were,  almost  without  exception,  benevolences,  and 
who  needed  help  so  much  as  these  ? 

The  blind  men  of  the  New  Testament  form  a 
very  interesting  group  of  characters.  Of  them  we 
know  the  name  of  only  one,  Bartimeus,  the  son  of 
Timeus,  of  Jericho,  who  sat  begging  at  the  road- 

89 


90  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

side.  The  blind  man  whose  words  I  have  quoted 
is  nameless,  but  of  his  personal  history,  of  his 
mental  characteristics,  and  of  the  miracle  which 
restored  him  to  sight,  we  know  more  than  we  do 
about  Bartimeus.  This  entire  chapter — the  ninth 
of  John — is  given  up  to  the  story  of  his,  healing 
and  the  circumstances  which  attended  it.  John  is 
the  only  one  of  the  four  evangelists  who  mentions 
the  circumstance,  but  that  is  not  strange,  for  he  is 
the  only  one  of  the  four  who  gives  us  an  account 
of  the  Judean  ministry,  a  period  of  about  two 
months. 

In  the  case  of  Bartimeus,  it  was  the  blind  man 
who  heard  the  sound  of  tramping  feet,  and,  learn- 
ing that  Jesus  was  passing,  cried  to  Him  out  of 
darkness  for  sight.  In  this  case,  Jesus  sees  the 
blind  man,  and  apparently  without  any  request 
on  his  part,  heals  and  delivers  him  from  hopeless 
despair.  Hopeless  despair,  for  he  was  blind  from 
his  birth.  There  is  this  difference  between  a  man 
born  blind  and  one  who  has  lost  his  sight  by  acci- 
dent or  disease, — the  latter  knows  what  sight  is, 
knows  something  of  the  manifold  glory  of  earth 
and  sky,  and  has  a  little  fringe  of  green  around  his 
desert,  a  little  world  of  beauty  which  memory  re- 
creates for  him  at  his  bidding. 

I  need  not  rehearse  the  story  of  the  miracle;  it 
has  no  part  in  the  purpose  of  this  hour.  Nor  need 
I  engage  in  argument  for  miracles ;  that  is  foreign 
to  the  idea  in  view.  It  is  the  mental  attitude  of 
the  man  that  most  concerns  us,  his  absolute  assur- 
ance of  a  fact,  a  great  fact,  the  greatest  fact  in  the 


CHRISTIAN    CERTAINTIES  91 

world  to  him.  The  enemies  of  Jesus  were  trying 
to  confuse  this  man.  They  were  learned,  adroit, 
trained  in  the  tricks  of  casuistry,  and  they  at- 
tempted, by  critical  examination,  and  cross-ex- 
amination, to  lead  him  to  say  something  that 
might  compromise  the  claims  or  the  character  of 
Jesus.  ''What  did  He  say?  What  did  He  do? 
How  did  He  do  it  ?  Did  He  claim  to  be  a  prophet  ? 
Did  He  call  Himself  the  Son  of  God?  Are  you 
the  blind  man  we  saw  at  the  gate  this  morning? 
Were  you  blind  from  birth?  Has  He  given  sight 
to  others  ?  Where  is  He  now  ?  Did  He  say  where 
He  was  going?  Did  He  say  He  was  Lord  of  the 
Sabbath?  Did  He  claim  supernatural  power?" 
These,  or  such  questions,  came  so  numerously  and 
so  rapidly  that  he  declined  to  answer  them,  falling 
back  upon  the  one  thing  he  was  sure  of,  the  one 
fact  that  was  indisputable.  It  was  as  if  He  said, 
' '  I  know  nothing  about  where  He  is  or  what  He  is, 
or  what  He  claims  to  be;  one  thing  I  know,  one 
thing  only,  but  I  do  know  that, — yesterday  I  was 
blind  and  to-day  I  see. "  In  so  saying,  he  was  wise, 
He  had  no  gift  of  logic  or  disputation.  He  had  no 
scholarship  or  reputation  to  measure  with  theirs. 
But  he  had  a  fact,  a  fact  of  experience,  and  he 
stood  squarely  upon  that,  facing  all  comers  and  de- 
fying all  doubt  with,  ' '  This  one  thing  I  Imow. ' ' 

I  have  said  he  had  no  gift  of  logic.  Neverthe- 
less, there  was  logic  in  his  fact.  Logic  does  not 
necessarily  involve  orderly  processes  of  intellec- 
tion. There  is  more  logic  in  a  simple  demonstra- 
tion than  in  a  whole  volume   of  reasoning.     An 


^ 


i 


92  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

(old  philosopher  was  contending  that  there  is  no 
such  thing  as  motion.  His  opponent  in  the  singu- 
lar debate  simply  arose  and  strode  across  the  room. 
He  proved  motion  by  moving.     A  man  wrote  a 

(book  to  prove  that  no  vessel  could  cross  the  At- 
lantic propelled  by  steam.  A  steamship  carried 
Ithe  first  copies  of  his  book  across  the  sea.  There 
may  have  been  logic  in  his  argument,  but  there  was 
better  logic  in  the  steam.  Great  is  the  power  of 
a  single  fact. 

The  last  half  century  has  witnessed  a  marvelous 
awakening  of  interest  in  the  natural  and  applied 
sciences.  A  passion  for  facts  possesses  the  modern 
world.  A  practical  scientist  would  much  rather 
discover  a  fact  in  his  field  than  a  nugget  of  gold. 
A  naturalist  has  given  us  a  book  on  "Ants."  He 
has  been  studying  ants.  He  knows  all  about  their 
nature  and  their  habits.  He  has  discovered  that 
they  have  their  systems  of  government,  their  armies, 
and  governors,  and  servants,  and  tramps.  Think 
of  a  great  man  spending  years  in  cultivating  the 
intimate  acquaintance  of  insects!  Are  insects  so 
important  as  all  that?  Can  we  put  this  knowl- 
edge to  any  practical  account?  No — there  is  no 
thought  of  that.  But  the  world  is  eager  for  Imowl- 
edge,  knowledge  of  things  large  and  small,  near 
and.  far,  and  nothing  that  promises  the  reward  of 
knowledge  is  too  remote  or  too  inconsequential  to 
be  studied. 

To  be  sure,  there  are  sciences  which  do  not  deal 
with  facts,  which  have  nothing  to  do  with  con- 
crete   phenomena.     They    treat    of   relations,    hy- 


CHRISTIAN    CERTAINTIES  93 

potheses,  probabilities.  Such  a  science  is  that  of 
pure  mathematics  in  which  the  suppositions  are  en- . 
tirely  arbitrary.  But  the  sciences  in  which  most 
of  us  are  interested  rest  upon  observation  and  ex- 
periment, and  the  bases  of  these  are  in  facts. 
So  pervasive  is  the  practical  spirit  in  the  world 
that  the  impression  prevails  in  some  quarters  that 
science  affords  us  the  only  certain  ground,  that  re- 
ligion is  not  a  science  because  destitute  of  facts, 
and  hence  can  have  no  standing  among  scientific 
thinkers. 

Permit  me  to  remind  you  that  religion  is  a 
science.  It  has  its  speculative  side;  we  call  that 
dogmatic  theology,  which  is  a  study  of  relations. 
But  it  has  also  its  practical  side,  on  which  we  find 
a  firm  foundation  of  facts.  The  Christian  believer 
has  a  ground  of  certainty  in  a  wide  range  of  pos- 
itive phenomena.  He  is  as  fully  justified  in  say- 
ing, *'I  know"  as  any  man  who  comes  to  us  with 
his  volume  of  facts  gathered  by  the  help  of  micro- 
scope, or  scalpel,  or  crucible.  Christianity  has 
its  certainties.  *'We  speak  that  we  do  know,  and 
testify  that  we  have  seen." 

One  of  the  first  facts  that  confronts  us  in  the 
study  of  the  Christian  religion  is  that  in  the  Hojx. 
Scriptures  we  have  a  volume  so  rich  and  strong, 
so  noble  and  inspiring,  that  the  world's  libraries 
do  not  contain  its  equal ;  a  Book  of  sixty-six  parts, 
written  by  at  least  thirty-eight  different  authors, 
in  different  countries,  covering  a  period  of  sixteen 
hundred  years,  yet  the  whole  cohering  by  an  in- 
terior principle  of  unity  so  remarkable  as  to  sug 

f 


1 


94  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

gest  that  it  must  have  had,  from  the  beginning,  a 
supervising  ]\Iind.  Measured  by  the  greatness  of 
its  subjects,  by  the  sublimity  of  its  treatment  of 
them,  by  the  perfection  of  its  ideals,  by  its  ' '  verbal 
felicities  and  intensities,"  by  its  relation  to  the 
problems  of  human  life  and  destiny — the  q^uestions 
of  to-day  and  to-morrow — by  its  historic  influence 
in  the  world,  and  by  its  effect  upon  the  lives  of 
those  who  receive  it,  it  is  so  different  from  other 
books,  from  other  so-called  sacred  books,  that  its 
Divine  origin  is  self-authenticated. 

Treat  the  Book  as  we  may,  reject  it  as  some  have 
done,  neglect  it  as  we  all  do,  it  is  yet  a  fact  to  be 
considered,  to  be  accounted  for,  to  be  numbered 
among  the  great  certainties  of  our  faith.  If  it  be 
not  a  fact  to  stand  on,  it  is  at  least  a  fact  to  start 
from,  that  our  Book  possesses  such  qualities  as  have 
evoked .  incomparable  tributes  from  the  deepest 
and  keenest  minds.  Coleridge  says,  *'It  finds  me 
at  greater  depths  of  my  being  than  any  other 
book.''  Sir  Isaac  Newton  says,  ''I  find  more  sure 
marks  of  authenticity  in  it  than  in  any  profane 
history  whatever."  Thomas  Carlyle  says,  of  a 
single  portion  of  it — the  Book  of  Job,  ''A  noble 
book!  All  men's  book!"  Edmund  Burke  says, 
"I  have  read  the  Bible  morning,  noon  and  night, 
and  I  have  been  a  happier  and  better  man  for 
such  reading."  William  H.  Seward  says,  ''The 
hope  of  human  progress  is  suspended  on  the  ever- 
growing influence  of  this  Book." 
#  I  do  not  quote  such  tributes  as  arguments  sup- 
\  porting  the  supernatural  character  of  the  Bible. 


CHRISTIAN   CERTAINTIES  95 

I  quote  them  in  support  of  the  proposition  that  the 
text-book  of  Christianity  is,  itself,  a  great  fact. 
Our  first  fact  is  the  Book,  so  full  of  God  that  "it  \ 
thrills  us  like  the  touch  of  a  living  hand ; "  so  full  ' 
of  truth  and  grace  that  it  has  a  message  for  us 
when  we  wreathe  our  brides  and  when  we  shroud 
our  dead. 

There  is  a  further  fact,  that  in  this  Book  we 
have  the  historic  basis  of  a  Gospel  which  appeals 
to  the  entire  range  of  human  faculties.  It  appeals 
to  the  reason.  It  has  never  numbered  among  its 
adherents  more  than  a  third  of  the  population  of 
the  globe,  but  it  dominates  the  really  constructive 
races  of  men.  It  appeals  to  the  imagination;  the 
art  of  the  world  is  liberally  devoted  to  the  cause 
of  religion,  whether  in  architecture,  painting,  mu- 
sic, or  poetry.  It  appeals  to  the  emotions ;  tears  of 
grief  and  songs  of  joy  are  mingled  in  the  mani- 
fold music  of  the  Church;  there  is  no  story  that 
so  melts  the  heart  of  the  sons  of  men  as  that  of 
Jesus  and  the  cross.  It  appeals  to  the  conscience; 
the  triumph  of  Christianity  in  the  Fiji  Islandst 
is  significant.  "When  John  Hunt  went  there  in  \ 
1838,  children  were  sold  to  be  killed  and  eaten, 
but  when  he  preached  the  Gospel  to  them,  their 
consciences  were  so  stirred,  they  became  so  penitent, 
that  great  numbers  of  them  would  cry  aloud  and 
bewail  their  former  depravity.  You  could  not  buy 
a  human  being  in  those  islands  to-day  at  an}^  price. 
This  Gospel  appeals  also  to  the  will, — it  commands 
men's  service. 

What  is  the  strongest  human  passion?     Is  it  the 


96  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

desire  for  property,  or  the  lure  of  the  unknown, 
or  the  lust  of  power,  or  the  passion  known  as  love  ? 
What  will  not  men  do  for  gold?  They  will  sail 
stormy  seas,  traverse  deathly  deserts,  or  brave 
Alaskan  snows.  The  passion  for  discovery  led  the 
Genoese  sailor  to  trust  his  tiny  caravels  to  an  un- 
charted ocean,  led  Balboa  to  plunge  into  the 
thickets  of  an  unknown  wilderness,  led  Nansen 
to  isolate  himself  for  three  years  in  the  vast  wastes 
of  a  region  of  eternal  ice.  And  all  that  man  can 
do  or  suffer,  men  have  done  and  suffered  for  the 
sake  of  love.  Is  there  any  passion  stronger  than 
'these?  There  is.  Look  at  Paul;  look  at  Xavier; 
look  at  William  Carey,  and  Adoniram  Judson, 
and  William  Taylor,  and  David  Livingstone,  and 
Dr.  Grenfell.  This  is  the  missionary  motive,  and 
it  is  stronger  than  desire  for  gold,  or  the  passion 
ifor  discovery,  or  the  impulse  of  human  love.  It 
is  stronger  than  these  because  it  is  more  persistent. 
The  Argonaut  despairs  at  length,  the  discoverer 
returns  with  wfell-earned  fame,  the  lover's  ardor  is 
quenched  with  age  or  altered  ideals,  but  the  cross- 
bearer,  the  messenger  of  peace,  toils  on  a  lifetime, 
content  to  do  his  Master's  will,  even  though  he  see 
no  result  of  his  labor.  Even  in  his  death  a  Chris- 
tian passion  for  the  winning  of  the  souls  of  men 
burns  none  the  feebler,  and  his  life  goes  out  in 
prayer  for  those  his  Master  died  to  save.  David 
Livingstone  was  found  dead  in  the  attitude  of 
prayer  in  his  rude  hut  in  the  forest.  Horace  Pit- 
kin, who  met  his  death  in  China  during  the  Boxer 
rebellion,    sends   back   this   message   to   America, 


CHRISTIAN    CERTAINTIES  97 

**Tell  my  wife  to  take  care  of  our  little  son,  and 
when  he  is  a  man,  let  him  come  here,  and  take  my; 
place."  This  Gospel  commands  the  services  of 
men,  it  appeals  to  the  heroic  in  man.  And,  in 
truth,  is  there  any  faculty  to  which  it  does  not 
speak  with  power?  Not  one.  It  sweeps  the  whole 
horizon.  It  was  made  for  man.  It  was  made  by 
Ilim  who  made  man. 

And  now  another  fact.  He  who  said,  "One 
thing  I  know,  that,  whereas  I  was  blind,  now  I 
see,"  had  hold  of  an  interior  fact,  a  fact  of  con-  «  O 
sciousness,  and  these  are  the  ultimate  facts  from  I  ^ 
which  there  is  no  appeal.  A  man  born  blind,  to 
whom  there  comes  the  sudden  revelation  of  the 
visible  universe,  the  splendid  panorama  of  hills 
and  valleys,  rivers  and  clouds,  is  conscious  of  a 
change  within  him,  which  makes  him  something 
he  was  not  before,  makes  him  more  a  man  than  he 
has  been.  Ask  him,  "How  old  are  you?"  and  he 
may  say,  "I  did  not  begin  to  live  until  I  began  to 
see."  Such  a  miracle  is  a  figure  of  what  occurs 
in  a  life  which  ac<3epts  Christ  as  personal  Friend 
and  Saviour.  It  is  only  when  our  spiritual  eyes 
are  opened  we  begin  to  live,  begin  to  see  things  in 
their  true  light.  Thorwaldsen,  who  was  born  in 
Copenhagen,  when  asked,  "When  were  you  born?"  - 
replied,  "  I  do  not  know,  but  I  arrived  in  Rome  T 
at  such  and  such  a  time."  He  dated  his  birth 
from  the  beginning  of  his  artistic  education. 
Many  another  has  dated  the  real  commencement  of 
his  life  from  the  beginning  of  his  education,  has 
said,  "I  did  not  begin  to  live  until  I  read  that 


98  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

book,  until  I  met  that  man."  I  have  heard  a  fa- 
mous scholar,  a  man  of  splendid  endowment  of  heart 
and  brain,  say  of  one  of  his  teachers,  an  obscure 
I  and  humble  person,  who  had  given  him  his  first 
impulse  towards  the  ideal,  ''He  was  the  father  of 
Whe  best  part  of  me. " 

No  one  of  us  begins  to  live  until  he  learns  what 
to  live  for,  how  to  live  aright,  to  live  in  the  love 
of  God,  in  the  joy  of  His  strength,  in  dutiful 
obedience  to  His  will.  If  acquaintanceship  with 
Jesus  Christ  introduces  us  to  that  view  of  life,  if 
/the  study  of  His  life  inclines  us  to  that  view,  then 
/  is  not  His  power  to  affect  us  vitally  a  fact  to  be 
I  numbered  among  the  impregnable  data  of  con- 
\  sciousness?  Much  has  been  said  of  friendship,  of 
culture  by  friendship,  of  friendship  as  the  master 
passion.  One  of  the  most  constant  experiences  of 
the  Christian  is  a  certain  sense  of  the  friendship  of 
Jesus  Christ.  The  important  question,  in  de- 
termining the  practical  value  of  Christian  experi- 
ence, is  not  so  much,  AVhat  does  Jesus  do  for  us? 
as  it  is,  T^'hat  does  His  friendship  do  for  us?  If 
it  sets  us  right,  and  helps  to  keep  us  right,  makes 
us  ashamed  of  all  ignoble  things,  excites  in  us  high 
and  honorable  aspirations,  the  fact  of  that  friend- 
ship must  be  accounted  of  first  importance  in  es- 
timating the  forces  that  make  life  great  and  strong 
and  true. 


IX 

MY  WITNESSES 


f  A 


^^.vx^ 


sV^X  • 


// 


"  The  old  conception  that  Jesus  in  the  act  and  article  of 
His  death  paid  for  us  a  debt  which  we  could  not  pay  for 
ourselves  made  a  strong  appeal  for  Christian  activity. 
Stronger,  however,  is  the  motive  which  the  conception  of 
the  progressive,  age-long  work  of  a  suffering  Redeemer  calls 
into  life.  Faith  in  Christ,  present  in  the  world,  bearing 
our  sins,  and  wounded  in  all  our  transgressions,  cannot  but 
persuade  us,  as  it  did  Paul,  that  it  is  a  privilege  to  fill  up 
that  which  is  lacking  in  the  afflictions  of  Christ.i  We  may 
endure  with  Him  the  weight  of  the  world's  woe;  we  may  be 
laborers  together  with  Him;  we  may  share  with  Him  the 
work  of  redeeming  the  world.  Our  connection  with  Him  is 
real,  not  sentimental.  We  are  genuine  actors  on  the  stage, 
and  upon  us  rests  a  heavy  responsibility.  By  our  wilful- 
ness we  quench  His  spirit,  obstruct  His  work,  lead  Him  anew 
to  Gethsemane.  By  our  faithfulness  we  glorify  Him.  We 
augment  His  efficiency  in  the  world,  and  hasten  the  day  of 
His  victory.  The  battle  we  are  fighting  is  a  real  one.  We 
are  not  mimic  soldiers,  marching  and  countermarching  on  a 
stage.  Great  issues  are  being  decided  by  our  conduct.  If 
the  world  battle  is  won,  it  will  be  won  in  and  through  hu- 
manity. It  will  be  by  the  Divine  energy  expressing  itself 
through  obedient  human  wills.  Man  is  an  indispensable 
agent  in  the  vast  work  of  healing  the  open  wound  of  the 
world.  This  complete  identification  of  ourselves  with  Christ 
in  redemption  makes  a  deeper  call  on  our  love  and  energy 
than  does  gratitude  for  a  finished  work.  To  us,  as  to  Simon, 
is  given  the  privilege  of  helping  the  Christ  to  bear  His  cross 
up  Calvary." 

{Atonement  in  Literature  and  Life.  Charles  Allen  Dinsmore. 
pp.    242,    243.) 

^Col.   i.   24. 


IX 

MY  WITNESSES 
"Ye  shall  be  witnesses  unto  Me."     Acts  i.  8. 

The  last  words  of  our  friends  are  ever  memor- 
able. Even  though  we  have  not  heard  or  heeded 
their  other  sayings,  we  give  ear  to  their  speech  as 
they  pass  from  us  into  the  gathering  mists  of  the 
world  unseen. 

The  text  is  a  part  of  the  last  recorded  message 
of  Jesus.  *'When  He  had  spoken  these  things 
.  .  .  He  was  taken  up. ' '  He  never  spoke  a  use- 
less word,  much  less  a  false  one.  So,  whatever 
value  we  attach  to  His  other  utterances — and  all 
He  said  was  weighty  and  momentous — we  must  es- 
teem His  last  words,  His  valedictory,  of  superlative 
importance. 

Three  things  mark  the  closing  address  of  the 
Master  to  His  disciples:  His  confidence, — He 
knows  how  great  is  the  work  the  little  company 
of  His  friends  are  to  undertake,  yet  He  speaks  as 
though  He  were  sure  of  the  eventual  triumph  of 
their  cause;  His  consciousness  of  His  own  place 
in  the  preaching  of  the  Gospel, — they  are  to  preach 
His  Gospel,  do  what  He  had  commanded,  be  wit- 
nesses unto  Him;  then  there  is  His  clear  concep- 
tion of  the  plan  by  which  His  Gospel  is  to  be  con- 

101 


102  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

veyed  throughout  all  the  world.  It  is  a  simple  plan, 
— sublime  in  its  simplicity.  First,  the  disciples  are 
to  be  prepared  by  a  spiritual  empowerment;  then 
they  are  to  testify  everywhere.  That  is  all,  but  it 
is  more  than  seems  at  first.  Out  of  that  plan  are 
to  come  churches,  missionary  societies,  Young 
Men's  Christian  Associations,  Societies  of  Chris- 
tian Endeavor,  Brotherhoods  of  Andrew  and 
Philip,  Federations  of  Student  Volunteers,  and  a 
thousand  other  organized  agencies  designed  to 
carry  the  commission  of  Jesus  Christ  into  effect. 

On  the  whole,  it  is  the  very  simplicity  of  the 
method  by  which  He  proposes  to  evangelize  the 
world  that  impresses  us  most  profoundly.  It  is 
all  summed  up  in  two  words,  ''My  witnesses." 
There  is  nothing  here  about  churches  and  sacra- 
ments, the  Bible  and  the  ministry,  public  worship 
and  sermons.  There  is  nothing  here  that  prohib- 
its these.  Presently  they  take  their  proper  place 
in  the  developments  of  the  Apostolic  age.  But,  at 
first,  all  emphasis  is  laid  on  the  personal  testimony 
of  the  personal  witness  concerning  Jesus  Christ. 

Very  much  depends  upon  our  correct  understand- 
ing of  the  office  of  a  witness.  The  word  ' '  witness ' ' 
as  used  in  the  New  Testament,  may  refer  to  one 
who  is  a  spectator;  to  one  who  tells  what  he  has 
seen;  to  one  who  testifies  in  court,  or  to  one  who 
seals  hi^  testimony  by  suffering  or  by  death.  The 
first  three  meanings  are  practically  included  in  our 
Lord's  word,  and  the  fourth  has  often  been  im- 
posed upon  the  others  by  the  hostility  of  the  world 
to  the  Christian  faith. 


MY   WITNESSES  103 

The  first  call  of  those  who  would  be  disciples  , 
of  Jesus  Christ,  is  to  an  actual  experience.     We 
are  expected  to  form  our  opinions  concerning  Him 
from  contact  with  Him,  from  knowledge  of  Him, 
rather  than  from  speculation  about  Him.     His  is 
the  call  of  that  friend  of  Job  who  says,  ''Acquaint'/ 
now  thyself  with  Him."     His  is  the  ideal  of  the 
Apostle,  who  thus  expresses  the  purpose  of  his  life, 
"That  I  may  know  Him,  and  the  power  of  His// 
resurrection. ' ' 

There  is  this  difference  between  knowledge  and 
belief:  knowledge  is  based  upon  experience;  be- A 
lief  is  the  result  of  a  mental  process.  He  whose 
testimony  is  founded  upon  knowledge  is  sure.  He  / 
whose  testimony  is  founded  upon  an  intellectual 
process  may  be  shaken.  The  Spirit  of  Christ  does 
a  twofold  work  in  human  salvation;  He  works  for 
us,  and  in  us.  What  Jesus  Christ  has  done  for 
men  is  important  to  men,  but  what  He  does  in  men 
is  more  important  to  the  world.  All  the  world 
knows  that  He  lived  an  ideal  life,  and  that  He 
died  a  hero's  death.  We  believe  He  conquered 
death,  and  ascended  to  be  our  eternal  Intercessor. 
This  is  what  He  does  for  us.  But  there  is  another 
world,  an  interior,  personal  world,  in  which  Christ 
offers  to  prove  His  title  as  Saviour.  What  goes  on 
in  this  inner  world  each  of  us  is  best  qualified  to 
say  for  himself: — whether  He  subdues  the  misrule 
of  passions  here,  whether  He  brings  order  out  of 
this  inward  anarchy,  whether  He  gives  us  the 
beauty  of  holiness  for  the  ashes  of  penitence, 
whether  He  strengthens  the  will  to  make  the  right 


104  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

choice  between  good  and  evil,  whether  He  casts  out 
fear  and  causes  us  to  rest  in  the  midst  of  endless 
agitation.  All  this  falls  within  the  sacred  pre- 
cincts of  one's  own  spiritual  consciousness,  and  the 
facts  of  this  life,  this  world,  are  the  subject  mat- 
ter of  our  testimony. 

It  is  the  duty  of  the  witness  to  interpret  his  ex- 
perience to  those  who  are  strangers  to  it  in  terms 
that-  they    can    comprehend.     The    witness    is    to 
know,  and  then  to  translate  his  knowledge  into  the 
language    of    earth.     Notwithstanding    the    very 
natural  impulse   of  one  who  has  been  fortunate 
to  desire  to  impart  his  joy  to  others ;  in  spite  of  the 
strong  social  tendency  to  share  our  good  news  with 
our  fellows,  there  is  in  religion  a  counteracting 
impulse    away    from    publicity.     The    mystic    is 
prone  to  be  content  to  muse  upon  the  miracle  of  his 
fellowship  with  God,  but  the  Christian  mystic  may 
/not  stop  at  musing.     "While  I  was  musing  the 
I  fire    burned:    then    spake    I    with    my    tongue." 
Speech — this  is  the  great  human  element  in  the 
program  of  the  Kingdom  of  God.    ' '  Go  quickly,  and 
tell     .     .     .     that  He  is  risen  from  the  dead." 
Kun,  speak  to  that  young  man."    *'Pray  for  me 
that  utterance  may  be  given  me,  that  I  may  make 
[known   the  power  and  mystery  of  the   Gospel." 
*'Let  him  that  heareth  say,  Come."     Is  this  mere 
lip-service?     It  is  lip-service,  but  not  mere   lip- 
service.     Consider  the  little  less  than  omnipotent 
I  power  of  speech.     ''Where   the   word   of   a   king 
us,  there  is  power."     It  is  the  Word  of  God  that  is 
>  a  sword,  '  *  living  and  energetic. ' '    Words,  spoken 


MY   WITN"ESSES  105 

or  written,  have  created  revolutions.  Words,  sup- 
ported by  mental  and  moral  energy,  have  uplifted 
nations.  Never  do  we  approach  so  nearly  the  dig- 
nity of  creation — I  mean  the  dignity  of  being  our- 
selves creators, — as  when  we  take  the  meaningless 
elements  of  speech,  and  by  combining  them,  give 
shape  to  thought. 

"I  have  known  a  word  hang  starlike 

O'er  a  dreary  waste  of  years, 
.  And  it  only  shone  the  brighter 

Looked  at  through  a  mist  of  tears. 

"I  have  seen  a  spirit,  calmer 

Than  the  calmest  lake,  and  clear 
As  the  heavens  that  bent  above  it, — 
Ne'er  a  wave  of  doubt  or  fear, 

"But  a  storm  has  swept  above  it, 

And  its  deepest  depths  were  stirred, 
Nevermore  to  slumber, — 
Only  by  a  word." 

Sometimes  the  effect  of  a  word  is  to  calm  a 
storm  rather  than  to  storm  a  calm.  It  is  written 
in  one  of  the  Gospels  that  when  Jesus  was  about 
to  confer  the  power  of  speech  upon  a  dumb  man, 
He  looked  up  to  heaven  and  sighed,  groaning  in- 
wardly. It  has  been  remarked  that  possibly  the  \ 
Master  hesitated  before  He  conferred  such  vast  ' 
power  upon  a  human  life.  We  are  accustomed  to 
confess  the  power  of  a  word  for  good;  it  may  be 
Jesus  was  thinking  of  the  possible  power  of  speech 
for  evil. 

It  is  an  amazing  fact  that  the  whole  civilized 
world  was  evangelized  during  the  first  few  cen- 


II 


106  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

turies  of  the  Christian  era.  That  was  before  the 
age  of  printing.  Preaching  was  almost  wholly 
by  the  living  voice.  Hume  observes  that  the  rapid 
propagation  of  the  Gospel  was  in  large  part  due 
to  the  fact  that  every  Christian  felt  it  laid  upon 
him  as  a  part  of  his  profession  of  faith  in  Christ, 
to  bear  verbal  witness  to  his  knowledge  of  Christ. 
The  author  of  the  last  book  in  the  Bible  speaks  of 
a  vision  in  which  he  sees  the  Church  triumphant, 
the  spirits  of  the  redeemed  who  had  overcome  "by 
I  /the  blood  of  the  Lamb,  and  by  the  word  of  their  tes- 
timony. ' '  What  an  honor  it  is,  thus  conferred  upon 
the  ministry  of  human  speech, — to  be  accounted 
worthy  of  mention  in  the  same  moment  with  the 
Divine  Sacrifice! 

That  there  has  been  a  decline  in  the  volume  of 
verbal  testimony  is  doubtless  due  to  the  fact  that 
in  recent  ages  the  Church  has  multiplied  its  agen- 
cies for  disseminating  the  Gospel.  The  printed 
Bible  is  the  property  of  all  men,  and  not  alone 
literature,  but  art,  and  philanthropy,  and  civiliza- 
tion itself  furnish  a  manifold  witness  for  Christ. 
Moreover,  separate  orders  of  pastors,  evangelists, 
missionaries,  teachers,  and  other  official  witnesses 
have  in  some  degree  diminished  the  sense  of  re- 
sponsibility that  once  rested  upon  every  Christian. 
There  can  be  no  doubt,  however,  that  the  same  obli- 
gation rests  upon  us  all  who  profess  the  faith  to 
make  known  to  men  the  power  of  Christ's  indwell- 
ing grace.  Who  doubts  that  Christianity  would 
take  a  long  step  forward  if  all  its  members  were 


^^^y'^^        -^  MY   WITNESSES  107 

to  acknowledge  and  fulfill  their  ministry  as  faith- 
ful witnesses  of  their  Master? 

Our  first  duty  is  to  know.  Our  second  duty  is 
to  tell.  The  third  duty  is  to  recognize  the  fact 
that  the  world  is,  and  always  will  be,  a  court  be- 
fore which  the  Christian  is  expected  to  testify  in 
the  case  of  Faith  versus  Unfaith.  I  mean  to  say, 
the  world  expects  him  thus  to  testify.  There  was 
a  Christian  business  man  who  was  greatly  inter- 
ested in  the  welfare  of  his  employes.  He  provided 
generously  for  their  compensation,  for  their  com- 
fort while  they  were  at  work.  He  had  the  habit  of 
remembering  the  families  of  his  laborers  with  gifts 
at  Christmas  time.  One  day  he  spoke  to  a  clerk  on 
the  subject  of  religion,  and  as  he  did  so,  apologized 
for  intruding  upon  a  realm  which  was  foreign  to 
their  business  relations.  The  clerk  said,  ''You  I 
need  not  apologize;  I  have  often  wondered  why 
you  never  spoke  of  that  matter  before.  I  have  / 
been  disappointed  that  you  did  not  mention  the/ 
subject  long  ago.''  Then  said  the  merchant,  "In 
that  case  I  apologize  to  you  for  my  neglect,  and  I 
will  ask  my  Master's  forgiveness."  That  man 
had  the  right  idea  of  his  duty.  It  was  his  business 
as  a  confessing  Christian,  and  it  is  ours,  to  let  no 
seasonable  opportunity  go  unemployed  to  speak 
a  good  word  for  the  faith.  Do  you  remember  that 
sweet  and  pathetic  story  in  one  of  Ian  MacLaren's 
books,  of  the  young  minister  who  put  aside  his 
academic  discourse  and  preached  a  simple,  per- 
suasive sermon,  because  there  came  over  him  that 


i   * 

108  COLLEGE    SERMONS 

»    Sunday  morning  his  mother's  memory,   and  her 
/  J  words,  ' '  Speak  a  good  word  for  Jesus  Christ ' '  ? 
^    That  Scotch  mother's  advice  appeals  to  laymen  as 
well  as  to  ministers. 

The  brightest  pages  of  Christian  biography  con- 
tain the  records  of  men  and  women, '  some  igno- 
rant and  some  learned,  some  humble  and  some 
conspicuous,  who  made  it  the  rule  of  their  lives  to 
be  witnesses  to  their  faith, — men  like  William  Tay- 
lor, John  Vassar,  and  Henry  Clay  Trumbull,  and 
women  like  Hannah  Whitall  Smith,  Jennie  Fow- 
ler Willing,  and  Frances  Willard.  Wherever 
these  people  went,  and  whomsoever  they  met,  they 
were  good  witnesses.  They  acted  exactly  as  if  they 
were  the  authorized  agents  of  the  Gospel  of  Jesus 
Christ.  They  were,  and  so  are  we,  but  we  have  for- 
gotten our  commission.  Let  us  look  at  our  creden- 
tials. *'Ye  shall  be  witnesses  unto  me."  Where? 
"In  Jerusalem."  Where  is  that?  It  is  where 
we  live,  where  we  are  best  known,  where  it  takes 
courage  of  a  high  degree  to  speak  about  religion. 
Where  else?  ''In  Judea."  Where  is  that?  It 
is  the  country  roimd  about  home,  familiar  ground, 
our  neighborhood,  the  adjoining  to^vIlship,  or  near- 
by cities.  Where  else?  ''In  Samaria."  Where 
is  that?  Among  people  who  are  not  friendly  to 
our  faith.  Where  else?  "Unto  the  uttermost 
part  of  .the  earth."  That  is  sufficiently  inclusive. 
So  the  whole  earth  is  to  be  belted  and  girdled  with 
Christian  testimony.  So  the  witness  of  Christ  is 
to  be  like  the  British  drumbeat,  heard  around  the 
world. 


MY   WITNESSES  109 

To  what  extent  the  Kingdom  of  God  has  been  ex- 
tended by  the  personal  testimony  of  Christians 
no  statistics  can  tell,  but  it  is  certain  that  a  very 
much  larger  number  of  persons  have  been  won  to 
the  Christian  vjew  of  life  by  personal  and  un- 
official speech  than  by  formal  public  discourse,  by 
debate,  by  learned  argument,  or  even  by  song. 

We  have  considered  the  duty  of  the  Christian  to 
know,  to  tell,  to  recognize  the  world  as  the  court 
in  which  he  is  expected  to  testify.  Now  a  word  as 
to  the  cross-examination,  by  which  I  mean  that 
part  of  the  testimony  in  which  the  witness  is  com- 
pelled to  vindicate  his  story,  to  authenticate  it. 
It  is  the  most  difficult  part  of  the  examination,  and 
it  is  where  a  great  many  witnesses  break  down  and 
annul  the  force  of  their  testimony.  The  cross-ex- 
amination of  the  Christian  is  the  inspection  of  his  I 
life  by  those  who  say,  *' Prove  your  faith  by  yourj 
works."  A  good  life  is  not  a  complete  testimony 
for  Christ,  but  a  verbal  witness  without  a  good 
life  is  worse  than  useless.  The  testimony  of  the 
lips,  imsustained  by  the  witness  of  the  life,  is  like 
a  coin  which  has  the  proper  image  and  superscrip- 
tion, but  is  spurious,  counterfeit,  made  of  base 
metal.  The  testimony  of  the  life  without  the  wit- 
ness of  the  lips  is  like  a  coin  which  rings  true,  is 
made  of  the  right  metal,  but  has  no  image  or  super- 
scription. (I  have  had  such  coins  returned  to  me, 
not  exactly  as  worthless,  but  as  of  doubtful  value.) 

Napoleon  said  to  his  soldiers  in  Egypt, 
''Twenty  centuries  look  down  upon  you  from  yon- 
der pyramids."     Two  worlds  look  down  upon  the 


110  COLLEGE    SERMONS 

soldiers  of  Jesus  Christ.     The  spirits  of  the  just 
made  perfect  rejoice  when  we   glorify  God,   and 
the  spirits  of  unjust  men,  and  of  just  men  not 
yet  made  perfect  in  Christ,  listen  to  what  we  say 
in  answer  to  the  old,  old,  yet  ever  new  question, 
I  "What  think  ye  of  Christ?"     There  is  an  inter- 
I  Zesting  story  of  Dore,  the  artist,  that  once,  crossing 
/  the  Italian  frontier,  he  had  mislaid  his  passport 
/  and  was  called  upon  to  prove  his  identity.     This 
I  he  did  by  taking  a  sheet  of  common  paper  and  a 
\i  piece  of  charcoal  and  tracing  the  homely,  manly 
\y  features  of  Victor  Emmanuel.     The  officers  knew 
^hat  only  Dore  could  draw  like  that.     Challenged 
by  the  world  as  we  are,  is  it  not  for  us  to  trace, 
here  and  now,  on  the  rough  surface  of  our  com- 
mon lives,  with  only  such  instruments  as  our  or- 
dinary circumstances  afford,  the  character  of  our 
King?     *'By  this  shall  all  men  know  that  ye  are 
My  disciples. '  * 


LIFE'S  GREAT  MEANING 


"The  preeminence  of  Jesus  does  not  lie  in  the  mere  fact 
that  He  did  this  or  said  that,  but  rather  in  the  general  im- 
pression of  His  life  as  the  sublime  exhibition  of  a  perfect 
trust  in  God  and  a  supreme  love  of  man.  He  demonstrates 
what  human  life  ought  to  be  and  what  it  can  be.  He  gives 
men  not  only  a  precept  to  follow,  but  a  life-motive  suffi- 
ciently powerful  to  enable  them  to  put  the  precept  into  ac- 
tion. He  Illustrates  the  victory  of  unselfish  love,  and  He 
creates  in  us  the  love  that  actually  serves  and  sacrifices  and 
conquers.  By  His  purity  He  shames  us  out  of  our  wrong- 
doing, and  by  His  doctrine  and  practice  of  forgiveness  He 
encourages  us  to  outgrow  our  sins.     He  makes  known   the 

I  heart  of  God  by  living  wholly  unto  God,  and  He  thereby 
warms  our  hearts  to  a  loving-kindness  that  creates  the 
kingdom  of  God.  By  His  example  He  reveals  the  way  of 
life;  by  the  winsome  and  forceful  influence  of  His  person- 
ality He  creates  in  us  the  earnest  desire  to  enter  and  the 
ability  to  walk  securely  in  the  way  of  eternal  life." 

{The   Church  of   To-day.     Joseph  Henry   Crooker.     pp.    168,   169.) 


life's  great  meaning 

"What  is  your  life?"     James  iv.  14. 

In  some  form  this  question  appears  in  all  serious 
literature,  ancient  and  modern.  Who  of  us  has 
not  followed  the  psalmist's  thought,  who  says: 
''When  I  consider  Thy  heavens,  the  work  of  Thy 
fingers,  the  moon  and  the  stars  which  Thou  hast 
ordained;  what  is  man,  that  Thou  art  mindful  of 
him?"  In  the  chamber  where  the  miracle  of 
birth  is  enacted,  or  by  the  couch  where  the  mys- 
tery of  death  occurs,  we  have  asked  the  meaning 
of  life.  On  the  bank  of  the  majestic  river  that 
rolls  its  volume  to  the  sea,  or  by  the  shore  of  that 
high-sounding  sea,  w^e  have  wondered,  ''So  runs 
my  dream,  but  what  am  I?"  Plucking  a  flower 
out  of  the  crannied  wall,  or  beneath  the  bright 
procession  of  the  October  stars,  the  query  rises 
in  our  minds  as  in  the  psalmist's,  the  Apostle's, 
the  poet's,  "What  is  the  nature  and  what  the  end 
of  this  life  of  ours?"  But  the  answer  is  far  from 
satisfying.  If  we  look  to  nature  for  a  solution 
of  the  problem,  we  shall  be  disappointed.  The 
birth  chamber  and  the  couch  of  death  are  alike 
dark  with  mystery,  and  the  mystery  is  equally 
great  whether  it  be  the  birth  of  a  child  or  a  bird, 

113 


114  COLLEGE    SERMONS 

whether  the  death  be  that  of  a  man  or  of  his  dog. 
The  river  and  the  sea  seem  sublimely  superior  to 
the  creature  that  questions  them.  The  little 
flower  might  say  with  truth,  "I  am  as  wonderfully 
made  as  you  are."  The  stars,  if  they  were  ani- 
mate, might  make  reply,  ''And  who  are  you,  mere 
pencil-points  in  distant  space,  that  you  should  dare 
to  interrogate  us  ? " 

Nature  is  not  particularly  flattering  to  the  pride 
of  the  man  who  seeks  to  know  his  own  place  in 
creation.  The  power  of  the  natural  forces  crushes 
him;  the  beauty  of  the  flower  shames  him;  the 
bulk  of  the  mountain  overshadows  him;  the 
rapidity  of  sound  and  light  outdistances  him;  the 
magnitude  of  the  stellar  space  bewilders  him.  In- 
numerable things  in  the  world, — mere  things, — 
seem  superior  to  human  life.  Yet  man  keeps  on 
forever  asking,  ''What  is  my  life?  So  runs  my 
dream,  but  what  am  IV  And  man  alone  asks 
such  a  question.     The  river,  the  sea,  the  flower, 

1  the  blazing  star, — no  one  of  these  ever  wrestled 
with  the  mystery  of  the  meaning  of  its  own  ex- 
istence.    So,  human  life  is  the  self-imposed  prob- 

]  lem  of  the  universe. 

But  human  life  is  not  the  only  problem  man 
sets  himself  to  solve.  He  studies  the  natural 
forces  and  elements  that  seem  superior  to  him, 
and  lo!  he  conquers  them.  The  river  is  navi- 
gated, tunnelled,  bridged,  turned  out  of  its  chan- 
nel. The  sea  is  dotted  with  the  fleets  and  navies 
of  nations.  The  wild  flower  is  made  to  multiply 
in   variety   and   grow   in   beauty    and    fragrance. 


life's  great  meaning  115 

The  stars  are  measured,  weighed,  analyzed.  The 
mind  of  man  more  and  more  exercises  dominion 
over  matter.  It  is  in  this  man  is  superior,  akin 
to  his  Creator,  exercising  dominion. 

A   poet,   among  the   giant  trees   of   California, 
said  he  seemed  to  hear  the  venerable  *' redwoods" 
saying  to  him,  **Your  age  is  as  nothing  to  ours." 
It  must  be  granted  that  a  tree  may  outlast  a  human 
body.     But  what  if  the  body  be  to  life  only  what 
the   shell   is   to   the   unhatched   bird?     What   if, 
within  the  body,   there   be   a  man  that  survives 
the  body?     Then  the  tree,  the  mountain,  or  the 
star,  simply  outlasts  the  shell  which  incases  human 
life   for   a   season.     The   mountain   and   the   star  j  I 
last  but  do  not  liv^.     ' '  The  thunderbolt  may  fall  i 
on  me  and  crush  me ;  yet  am  I  superior  to  it,  for  I 
I  know  and  it  does  not. "     It  is  the  power  to  know,  \ 
to  do,  to  choose,  to  will,  to  impress  our  will  upon  ] 
the  world  of  force,  that  makes  this  human   life] 
something  greater  than  it  seems. 

There  are  events  in  life,  phases  of  life  in  the 
sight  of  which  man  seems  an  inconsiderable  being, 
and  human  life  a  thing  to  be  despised.  Go  to 
those  provinces  in  Japan  where,  during  the  last 
winter,  men  and  women  and  children  were  starv- 
ing by  thousands;  where  but  a  few  years  ago, 
the  bodies  of  the  starved  were  piled  in  heaps  and 
burned.  Go  to  that  French  coal  mine,  where 
eleven  hundred  men  perished  but  yesterday  by 
the  explosion  of  fire  damp.  Have  you  ever  seen 
the  ''bone-pit"  at  Havana,  filled  with  innumerable 
scattered    skeletons    rudely    dispossessed    of   their 


116  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

sepulcher  at  the  expiration  of  a  brief  grave-lease? 
Have  you  thought  of  the  hundred  thousand  men 
who  lie  in  shallow  trenches  in  Manchuria, — white 
men  and  yellow  men  who  fought  in  full  sight  of 
the  world  a  little  while  ago?  Human  life  is  a 
small  thing,  it  seems.  Yes,  it  seems.  But  things 
are  not  often  what  they  seem. 

Look  at  Japan  again,  and  you  will  see  the 
Christian  love  of  the  world  pouring  its  treasures 
into  the  starving  province  to  feed  the  hungry  and 
jV  j  comfort  the  distressed.  Some  people  believe  in  the 
( brotherhood  of  man.  Look  again  at  that  French 
coal  mine;  and  you  will  see  a  collier  struggling 
through  the  darlmess  and  suffocating  vapor  with 
a  comrade's  dead  body  in  his  arms.  ''Greater 
love  hath  no  man  than  this."  The  valley  of  dry 
bones  at  Havana  is  not  so  very  different  from 
Pere  le  Chaise  at  Paris,  only  at  Paris  the  remains 
are  underground.  But  both  at  Paris  and  Havana 
you  may  see,  in  various  forms,  symbols  of  the 
faith  that  smiles  on  death  and  says,  ''I  shall  not 
Avholly  die."  A  new  national  life  for  Japan  and 
Russia  springs  from  the  crimson  dust  of  war. 
Things  are  not  what  they  seem. 

Edwin  Markham  saw  the  picture  of  ''The  Man 

(With  the  Hoe,"  and  in  his  poem  laments  the  death 
of  manhood,  the  tj^ranny  of  labor,  the  crushed 
spirit  of  the  industrial  slave.  It  is  all  in  the 
picture, — ^the  retreating  forehead,  the  deficient 
chin,  the  lusterless  eye,  the  hopeless  heart.  But 
there  is  another  picture  we  must  see.  It  is  tlie 
,  *'Angelus."     The  same  peasant,  in  type,  but  by 


life's  great  meaning  117 

his  side  is  another,  a  girl.  Love  has  entered  the 
life  of  ''the  man  with  the  hoe."  In  the  distance 
rises  a  church  spire,  and  it  is  the  hour  of  prayer, 
and  the  peasants  bow  their  heads.  God  has  en- 
tered the  life  of  ''the  man  with  the  hoe."  Life, 
with  labor  as  its  only  companion,  is  poor  indeed. 
But  love  transforms  labor,  and  God  sanctifies  both, 
and  life  grows  great  and  beautiful.  The  two  pic- / 
tures  must  be  studied  side  by  side. 

And  you  must  also  study  the  artist.  We  have 
not  seen  all  there  is  in  a  picture  until  we  have 
seen  the  painter.  He  was  right  who  said,  "Mani 
is  never  so  like  God  as  when  he  produces  a  work/ 
of  art.  He  approaches  the  very  power  of  God."/ 
He  does  actually  create  a  landscape,  or  a  figure, 
and  as  in  Millet's  case,  or  in  Turner's,  he  puts  a 
measureless  expanse  of  earth  and  sky  into  a  few 
square  inches  of  canvas.  What  is  life?  Look  at 
the  artist  at  his  best  and  say  what  life  is.  Or 
look  at  the  sculptor.  Buonarroti  saw  a  block  of 
marble  and  said,  "I  will  make  an  angel  out  of 
it."  And  he  did.  •  Socrates,  whose  father  was  a 
sculptor,  reflected,  *'Is  it  not  better  to  turn  man 
into  the  similitude  of  God  than  to  turn  marble 
into  the  similitude  of  man?"  So  he  became  a 
teacher.  If  you  would  know  the  power  of  human 
life,  look  at  the  teacher.  He  deals  not  with  in- 
sensate marble,  but  with  responsive  human  char- 
acter. He  says  of  his  human  material,  "I  will 
make  a  student  of  him,"  and  he  may.  Consider 
the  moral  teacher  who  says  of  the  student,  "I  will 
make  a  saint  of  him,"  and  he  may.     Arnold  Win- 


118  COLLEGE   SERMOXS 

kelried,  gathering  an  armful  of  the  enemy's 
spears  into  his  own  breast  and  "making  way  for 
liberty,"  is  a  fine  type  of  soldierly  service  and 
sacrifice.  But  what  shall  we  say  of  one  who,  as  he 
fights  his  way  over  life's  battlefield, — and  life  is 
a  battle  to  the  most  fortunate  of  men — gathers 
into  his  heart  of  friendship  one  and  another  and 
another  of  his  comrades,  and  at  the  battle's  close, 
and  life's,  offers  himself  to  the  Great  Commander, 
saying,  ''Here  am  I  and  those  whom  Thou  hast 
given  me."  Now  we  begin  to  see  the  power  and 
'dignity  of  manhood.  ''Thou  madest  him  a  little 
lower  than  the  angels;  Thou  cro\^Tiedst  him  with 
glory  and  honor." 

The  Holy  Scriptures  contain  two  or  three  sig- 
nificant sentences  touching  the  worth  and  mean- 
ing of  human  life.  "Thou  madest  him  a  little 
lower   than  the   angels "   is   a   comfortable   assur- 

fance.  But  let  us  read  it  in  another  version:  "a 
little  lower  than  God."  Is  there  any  confirmation 
of  such  a  view,  of  the  greatness  of  man  ?    We  have 

I  it  here:    "The  spirit  of  man  is  the  candle  of  the 
Lord."     And  what  is  a  candle?    A  miniature  sun. 
The  light  that  beams  from  the  candle  is  the  same 
kind  of  light  that  streams  from  the  sun.     It  is  one 
light,    in   morning    star   and    twilight    glowworm. 
The  spirit  of  man  is  the  same  kind  of  spirit  that 
dwells   in   God.     God   is   a  spirit;   so   is  man, — a 
spirit,  having  a  body.     And  the  spirit  of  man  is 
)  just  as  superior  to  matter,  just  as  invulnerable  to 
^  death,  as  God.     God  has  made  it  so. 
I      There  is  a  wonder  in  a  drop  of  water.     Whistler 


life's  great  meaning 


119 


tried  for  weeks  to  paint  it.     It  is  a  little  ocean  ^ 
in   itself.     A   trembling   dewdrop    on   a   spear   of 
grass  images  in  its  bosom  the  sky  as  perfectly  as  I 
does  the  sea  itself.     The  sun's  rays  color  it,  and  . 
the  winds  ripple  it,  just  as  they  do  the  sea.     0, 
soul  of  man,  thou  hast  in  finite  scope  the  image 
of  thy   God!     Well   art  thou  named   ''the   being 
with  the  upturned  face."     Each  of  us  is  born  of 
two  worlds.     We  get  our  bodies  from  the  earth, 
our  spirits  from  above.     Our  lives  are  what  our 
spirits    make    them.     Our    bodies    are   mere    con- 
veniences.    We  shall  get  along  without  them  pres- 
ently.    Emerson   said,   "We   can   get   along  very  I 
well   without   the   world."     He    knew   that   "the 
things  which  are  seen  are  temporal ;  but  the  things 
which  are  not  seen  are  eternal." 

It  is  because  our  lives  are  greater  than  they 
seem  that  we  are  social  beings.  Brutes,  afflicted, 
creep  away  to  die  alone.  In  our  times  of  trial  we 
crave  the  clasp  of  a  brother's  hand.  It  is  be- 
cause we  are  the  children  of  God  we  have  moral 
duties  and  obligations.  A  common  mongrel  cur  is 
under  no  obligation  to  become  a  thoroughbred,  a 
watchdog,  a  shepherd's  assistant.  A  dwarfed  bush 
on  an  arid  plain  is  under  no  obligation  to  grow 
to  towering  height.  But  a  human  life,  wherever 
found,  is  under  obligation  to  grow  towards  God. 
It  is  because  we  are  made  in  the  likeness  of  God 
we  have  heart-hunger  for  him.  As  said  Augus- 
tine :  * '  Thou  hast  made  us  for  Thyself,  and  in 
vain  do  we  seek  rest  until  we  find  it  in  Thee." 

I  stood  on  the  seashore  a  while  ago,  and  saw, 


r 


V 


$ 


y 


120 


COLLEGE   SERMONS 


rising  from  the  pier  a  tall  staff,  like  the  mainmast 
of  a  ship.  From  the  top  of  the  staff  there  ran  to 
the  base  a  strand  of  copper  wires,  ending  in  a 
curious  device  where  sat  a  man  pressing  a  key 
with  dots  and  dashes.  I  heard  no  sound  save  the 
metallic  click  of  the  instrument  for  several 
minutes;  then  came  a  series  of  short,  sharp  ex- 
plosions. The  operator  looked  up  and  answered 
j-rny  unspoken  question  by  saying,  **It  is  the 
steamer  Bermudian.  I  picked  her  up  three  hun- 
dred miles  out.  She  is  reporting  the  weather/' 
On  the  shore  of  earth  and  time  we  stand  and 
send  out  into  the  ''darkness  that  girds  our  life 
around"  our  voiced  and  voiceless  prayers.  And 
not  in  vain  do  we  sigh  for  God  and  cry  to  God. 
In  unnumbered  ways  He  makes  Himself  known  to 
us.  Our  very  longing  for  God  is  His  Spirit  work- 
ing in  us,  whispering,  "Seek,  and  ye  shall  find." 
And  in  His  unfailing  Word  He  bids  us  call  Him 
the  God  of  our  lives.  If,  then,  He  be  the  God 
of  our  lives,,  our  lives  are  dear  to  Him;  nor  are 
they  bounded  by  the  dates  of  birth  and  death. 
From  God  we  came;  to  God  we  shall  return. 
Whether  we  live  or  die,  therefore;  whether  we 
wake  or  sleep,  we  are  in  His  good  care. 


XI 

THE  ENLARGEMENT  OF  LIFE 


"This  is  why  Christianity  is  so  much  stronger  and 
steadier  than  creeds  and  ecclesiastical  institutions.  Not  sel- 
dom the  Christ  takes  hold  of  men,  not  through  their  thinking 
and  planning,  but  in  spite  of  all  that,  and  so  we  are  often 
surprised  at  the  amount  of  unoflBcial  Christianity  in  the 
world.  For  the  same  reason — because  the  Christ  is  a  fact 
of  experience — even  when  the  historical  or  metaphysical  fig- 
ure fades  away,  leaving  only  the  |deal.  men  have  still  to 
reckon  with  a  power  of  the  first  magnitude.  The  Christ  of 
experience  still  abides.  Under  the  name  of  The  Anointed 
One,  something  still  calls  to  our  dormant  spiritual  capacities 
to  awake.  It  makes  us  incorrigibly  dissatisfied  with  evil  in 
spite  of  our  love  for  it.  It  prescribes  for  life  a  goal  that 
is  self-evident  and  imperative,  and  it  seems  to  offer  just  what 
the  soul  desires  of  courage  to  work  steadily  for  the  highest 
when  postponements  and  apparent  failures  are  soliciting  us  to 
accept  as  our  good  something  less  than  the  best.  In  spite 
of  doubts,  the  Christ-figure  calls  aloud  to  the  deeps  of  our 
nature." 

{The  Religion  of  a  Mature  Mind.  George  Albert  Coe.  pp. 
418,    419.) 


XI 

THE  ENLARGEMENT  OF  LIFE 
**He  brought  me  forth  also  into  a  large  place."     Ps.  xviii.  19. 

Some  one  asked  the  chaplain  of  George  IV  if 
he  felt  no  fear  when  preaching  to  royalty,  and  the 
good  man  replied,  ''I  forget  that  there  are  prin- 
ces before  me  and  remember  only  that  there  are 
souls  to  instruct  in  godliness."  The  author  of 
this  psalm  forgot  that  he  was  a  king  when  he 
wrote  these  verses,  and  remembered  only  that  he 
was  a  soul,  that  he  had  been  helped,  and  by  Whom 
he  had  been  helped. 

There  are  three  singular  facts  about  this  psalm. 
It  occurs  twice  in  the  Holy  Scriptures,  once  in  II 
Samuel  and  once  in  the  Psalter.  It  contains  two 
verses  quoted  in  the  New  Testament,  one  in 
Romans  and  the  other  in  Hebrews.  These  verses 
are  ascribed  to  Christ,  as  they  appear  in  the  New 
Testament,  so  we  may  believe  that  it  is  something 
more  than  a  psalm  of  David, — that  King  David's 
Lord  speaks  through  it. 

But  here,  at  the  nineteenth  verse,  it  is  a  human 
soul  speaking.  He  is  rehearsing  the  many  mercies 
of  the  Lord.  He  has  just  said,  ''He  delivered  me 
from  my  strong  enemy.  He  drew  me  out  of  many 
waters.     He  was  my  stay."    You  know  what  a 

123 


^ 


124  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

.  stay  is  in  building.  It  is  a  prop.  As  applied  to 
I  /  persons,  a  stay  is  a  stand-by,  and  the  Greek  for 
"  stand-by  is  '*  Paraclete, "  and  we  translate  it 
''Comforter"  or  ''Advocate."  "If  any  man  sin 
we  have  an  Advocate  with  the  Father."  So  the 
psalmist  says,  "The  Lord  was  my  Advocate." 
Now  follows  the  text,-r"He  brought  me  forth  also 
into  a  large  place."  And  this  is  not  the  least 
precious  fact  here  adverted  to,  by  any  means. 

David  was  born  in  a  small  place,  moved  in  a 
small  circle  until  the  Lord  led  him  out.  Not  at 
once  was  he  led  into  a  large  place.  He  mounted 
to  the  throne  by  way  of  many  a  hardship  and 
many  a  battle.  It  was  so  with  Joseph.  He 
reached  the  palace  by  way  of  the  prison.  But  he 
came  to  the  larger  place  in  time,  as  did  Abraham 
before  him.  Ur  of  the  Chaldees  was  a  small  place. 
Abraham  had  no  outlook  there,  but  he  found  a 
large  place  in  Canaan,  a  large  place  on  earth,  and 
a  large  place  in  history.  Even  so  was  Moses  led. 
Egypt  was  a  small  place, — not  small  in  extent  of 
dominion,  nor  in  its  power  among  the  nations  of 
'the  world, — but  its  horizon  was  small.     The  palace 


•^\ 


is  a  poor  place  for  a  prophet.     Better  the  desert. 

%  *^*  'Better  the  meadows  of  Midian.     Better  the  moun- 

Q"  I  tains  of  Moab.     Better  the  wandering  through  the 

Ly  I  wilderness.     Better  the  Sinai  of  law,  the  Nebo  of 

\  vglory.  ^ 

This  has  been  the  song  of  all  God's  servants  in 
every  age, — ' '  He  brought  me  forth  also  into  a  large 

(place."     Obedience   to    God   never   contracts    our 
powers.     Christ  does  not  lead  men  backward,  but 


THE   ENLARGEMENT    OF   LIFE  125 

onward,  upward.  Matthew  was  led  into  a  large  \ 
place  when  he  left  the  toll-booth  to  follow  Jesus. 
Peter  had  never  seen  anything  larger  than  the 
Sea  of  Galilee  until  Jesus  made  him  a  fisher  of 
men.  Paul  at  his  best  was  only  a  theological 
hair-splitter,  a  heresy-hunter,  until  Christ  ap- 
peared to  him  and  filled  his  heart  with  a  passion 
for  the  preaching  of  the  Gospel  and  the  glory  of 
the  cross.  If  the  voice  of  patriarch  and  prophet 
and  apostle  could  be  heard  to-day  it  would  cry, 
"Never  say  *No'  to  God.  If  He  call  thee,  go. 
He  will  lead  thee  into  a  large  place." 

No  experience  is  more  common  to  the  most  of 
us  than  a  certain  contempt  for  the  littleness  of 
the  things  by  which  we  are  compelled  to  live. 
We  are  crowded  and  hemmed  in  by  our  circum- 
stances. We  are  painfully  limited.  The  farm 
boy  who  leaves  the  country  goes  to  the  city  to 
seek  a  more  abundant  life.  He  dreams  the  city 
calls  him  to  large  enterprises.  He  does  not 
know  how  cramped  are  the  lodgings  of  most  dwell- 
ers in  the  city,  how  small  a  part  of  it  he  will  oc- 
cupy, how  easily  the  solitary  individual  is  lost  in 
the  crowd.  James  A.  Garfield  heard  the  call  of 
the^ea  when  he  was  a  lad,  and  only  the  love  of  a 
widowed  mother  kept  him  from  following  a  sea- 
faring life.  Why  is  the  sea  so  attractive  to  many  ? 
Because  of  its  bounty,  its  unmeasured  space.  It  is 
a  touching  fact  that  at  the  end  of  his  life,  at  El- 
beron,  the  eyes  of  the  dying  President  rested  lov- 
ingly, longingly  on  the  sea.  Mr.  Blaine  suggests,  in 
his  eulogy,  that  then  his  friend  ''heard  the  great 


126 


COLLEGE   SERMONS 


K 


waves  breaking  on  the  farther  shore  and  felt  upon 
his  wasted  brow  the  breath  of  the  eternal  morn- 
ing." 

Thomas  Marshall,  of  Kentucky,  a  man  of  genius 
and  power,  expressed  his  desire  to  be  buried  in  an 
open  field  and  not  in  a  crowded  cemetery.  "I 
have  been  crowded  all  my  life, ' '  he  said ;  ' '  give  me 
Vroom  for  my  grave."  If  one  who  has  led  a  life 
of  intense  activity  and  great  prominence  feels  this 
ense  of  limitation,  is  it  strange  that  others  are 
dissatisfied,  whose  ordinary  lives  are  best  symbol- 
ized by  *'one  raindrop  falling  on  moor,  or 
meadow,  or  mountain,  one  flake  of  snow  melting 
into  the  immeasurable  deep"? 

I  have  heard  a  young  lawyer  say,  "When  I  was 
in  college  I  had  great  ambitions.  I  planned  to 
make  myself  an  authority  on  international  law, 
but  now  that  I  am  out  I  am  compelled  to  try 
mean  little  cases  before  mean  little  juries."  He 
had  not  found  the  large  place  he  sought.  The 
youth  who  would  be  a  painter  must  be  a  clerk, 
and  the  man  with  an  artist's  soul  is  selling  tea 
and  coffee.  Longfellow  tells  us  of  one  'Svhom 
nature  made  a  poet  but  whom  destiny  made  a 
schoolmaster."  We  cannot  map  out  our  orbit  as 
we  would.  We  crave  largeness.  Our  faculties 
seem  fitted  for  a  greater  sphere  than  that  in  which 
we  move.  Literature  is  full  of  the  expression  of 
this  fact.  *^ Songs  of  Unrest"  would  fill  volumes. 
Who  of  us  busy  daily  with  little  vexatious  prob- 
lems would  not  prefer  to  deal  with  great  ones? 
Who  of  us  fighting  battles  daily  which  only  God  can 


THE   ENLARGEMENT   OF   LIFE  127 

see,  would  not  prefer  to  fight  an  epoch-making  bat- 
tle?    It  is  the  insignificance  of  our  lives  that  frets 
us.     So,  whatever  enlarges  life  in  any  right  direc-l 
tion  is  a  benefaction. 

Blessed  is  imagination,  which  expands  the  walls 
and  lifts  the  low  roof  of  life,  and  fills  it  with 
dreams  of  what  might  have  been  and  of  what  may 
be.  Blessed  is  travel,  for  it  enlarges  the  horizon  of 
the  traveler  if  he  be  a  close  observer.  It  is  a 
distinct  step  in  one's  mental  development  when  he 
first  acquaints  himself  with  the  language  and 
customs  of  another  country  than  his  own.  It  is 
an  old  saying,  *'A  man  is  as  many  men  as  het 
can  speak  languages."  I  know  a  German  shoe- 
maker who  speaks  nine  languages,  and  he  has  ac- 
quired them  by  traveling  through  foreign  lands. 
He  goes  abroad  every  year  or  two,  tramps  through 
the  country  he  visits,  lives  the  life  of  the  people, 
and  then  comes  back  to  his  little  shop  to  cobble 
and  to  live  over  in  memory  the  scenes  of  his  now 
numerous  pilgrimages.  Blessed  is  literature,  for 
it  broadens  life.  To  most  of  us  time  to  travel  is 
denied.  But  books  are  not  denied  us, — books  of 
travel,  of  history,  of  science,  of  fiction.  A  late 
writer  advises  us  to  read  that  fiction  which  por- 
trays life  as  different  as  possible  from  our  own. 
"We  hardly  need  that  counsel.  A  certain  instinct 
guides  us  in  that  direction.  Dissatisfaction  with 
the  limitations  of  our  lives  impels  us  to  read 
stories  of  soldiers  and  knights  and  heroes  and 
heroic  deeds.  Far-off  ages  and  far-off  civiliza- 
tions attract  us.     We  broaden  our  lives  by  chang- 


128  COLLEGE    SERMONS 

ing  our  view-point.  Blessed  is  everything  that 
tends  to  widen  our  sympathies  and  give  us  the 
^  consciousness  of  new  relations.  Blessed  is  the 
religion  that  takes  us  out  of  ourselves,  makes  us 
superior  to  our  limitations,  creates  a  new  world 
for  us.  Supremely  blessed  is  the  Gospel  of  Jesus 
Christ,  for  of  all  religions  that  the  world  has  seen, 
it  offers  its  disciples  the  most  abundant  life. 

The  distinctive  glory  of  Christianity  is  its  ex- 
pansive spirit.     The  kejnote  of  it  is  the  greatest 
/possible  development  of  the  individual.     It  aims 
I  to  make  every  man  a  king,  every  heart  the  throne 
\of  the  Eternal,  every  life  a  consecrated  temple. 
''The  humblest  life  that  lives  may  be  Divine." 
ut  is   a  great  undertaking,   and  it  is  unique   in 
Christianity.     Confucius  never  taught  it.      There 
is  nothing  in  Confucianism  to  lead  the  individual 
soul   to   greatness.     Prudential   maxims   and   con- 

//ventional  morality  may  mean  a  b£tt£J:.«machine, 
but  they  do  not  increase  his  spiritual  resources. 
Buddha  taught-  the  extinguishment  of  the  indi- 
vidual. Epictetus  taught  the  suppression  of  emo- 
tion, the  denial  of  desire.     Christ's  doctrine   is: 

1 1  Diminish  nothing  that  is  right;  repress  nothing 

1 1  that  may  be  turned  to  good ;  do  not  diminish  your 
interests,  but  multiply  them;  live  th(^  largest  po^s- 

ifsible  life;  conquer  your  sorrows  by  making  the 
•1  sorrows  of  others  your  care ;  control  your  desires 
by  giving  them  a  new  direction;  extend  life  on 
every  side.  Is  not  this  the  Master's  teaching? 
Is  it  not  the  uniform  testimony  of  experience  that 
Christian  disci pleship  leads  every  faithful  soul  into 


THE   ENLARGEMENT    OF    LIFE  129 

a  large  place  ?    It  is  sin  that  narrows  life,  clips  the  t 
wings  with  which  the  spirit  would  soar  to  lofty  / 
heights.     Hence  the  conquest  of  sin  by  grace  is  f 
like   the   liberation   of   a   slave.     Fetters   fall   off. 
Iron  doors  and  brazen  gates  are  torn  asunder,  and 
the  captive  moves  out  into  God's  universe  to  learn 
how  life  enlarges  with  each  new  step  in  grace. 
There  is  a  song  which  says, — 

"Could  we  but  stand  where  Moses  stood 
And  view  the  landscape  o'er." 

Why,  we  can  stand  there;  we  do  stand  there! 
Our   view-point   is   at   the   side   of  Jesus    Christ,  i 
We  have  His  perspective.    We  see  things  as  He  | 
sees   them.     So   things   are  not   what   they  seem. 
Life  and  death,  time  and  duty,  sorrow  and  pain 
are  transfigured,  and  history  sweeps  on  towards 
that  ''far-off  Divine  event"  when  ''all  things  shall 
be  made  new."    Christ  wants  us  to  see,  to  hear,  to 
think,  to  feel,  to  act,  in  view  of  infinite  relations. 
^He  wants  us  to  know  that  selfishness  turns  life    .i     liM^' 
\  into  a  squirrel  cage ;  that  envy,  greed,  falsehood,    jT^   ^^ 
cruelty,  base  appetites,  imprison  men,   make  life  ^    i^^^^ 
small,  and  that  the  spirit  of  holiness  extends  all  \^^        ^ 
the  boundaries  of  the  inner  man.     Remember  this ;       J 
— for  the  idea  prevails  among  some  that   Chris- 
tianity limits  life,  except  in  the  direction  of  the 
future.     The  fact  is  there  is  nothing  else  that  so 
expands  it.     Not  imagination,  not  travel,  not  lit- 
erature, not  all  other  things  combined.     God  never  I 
calls  lis  to  impoverishment  or  isolation,  but  always  ' 


^H^, 


130 


COLLEGE   SERMONS 


V  W 


•  ft. 


• 

11 


to  enrichment  and  fellowship  with  the  spirits  of 
just  men  made  perfect. 

f  Christ  was  always  caUing  men, — Philip,  Nathan- 
ael,  the  rich  young  ruler,  Zaccheus,  Bartimeus, 
Lazarus,  Nicodemus.  Did  any  one  of  them  follow 
Him  and  fail  to  find  the  meaning  of  abundant  life  ? 
Did  any  one  of  them  turn  back  who  did  not  turn 
away  from  glory  and  honor  and  immortality? 
Years  ago  I  knew  a  life  that  was  transformed  and 
led  into  a  large  place  and  made  fruitful  in  abun- 
dant measure,  and  the  memory  of  it  lingers  in  my 
/mind  like  a  benediction.     A   common  ploughboy 

/   heard  somewhere  of  the  Great  Teacher,  who  made 

I  peasants  and  fishermen  His  disciples  and  let  them 
share  His  kingly  thoughts.  As  he  walked  behind 
the  plough,  he  said  to  himself,  *'I  would  like 
to  live  a  larger  life;  I  would  like  to  feel  the 
uplift  of  great  ideas.  If  the  Teacher  will  take  me 
,1  will  learn  of  Him."  From  that  hour  he  was  a 
scholar  in  the  school  of  Christ.  He  found  the 
I\Iaster   meek  -  and    lowly    of    heart    and    not    at 

^  all  like  some  teachers,  who  have  no  time  to  spend 
with   beginners.     Almost   before   he   knew   it   the 

•  boy  began  to  think  differently  of  nature,  of  people, 
of  all  God's  creatures.  He  found  himself  grow- 
ing more  patient  and  humane,  more  studious  and 
reverent,  richer  in  affection  and  keener  in  his  in- 
terest in  everything  that  concerned  the  welfare  of 
the  world.  There  was  no  sudden  spasm  of  emo- 
tion, but  a  gradual  breaking  away  from  old  con- 
ditions, a  gradual  ascension  Godward.  He 
thought  of  that  Young  Man  who  suffered  Himself 


THE   ENLARGEMENT   OF   LIFE  131 

to  be  baptized  that  He  might  leave  nothing  of  If 
righteousness  unfulfilled,  and  he  was  baptized.  He  ' 
thought  of  another,  who  said,  * '  I  am  debtor  both  to 
the  Greeks  and  to  the  Barbarians,"  and  he  said,  "I, 
too,  am  a  debtor  to  the  world."  So  he  began  to  con- 
verse with  people  about  the  sweet  reasonableness 
of  Christianity.  He  had  a  word  for  other  plough- 
boys,  and  a  whole  community  began  to  feel  the 
impulse  of  his  words  and  work.  He  never  entered 
the  ministry,  but  his  life  was  a  continual  ministry. 
From  the  farm  he  went  into  the  halls  of  the 
legislature  of  his  state,  and  from  there  to  the  J 
governorship,  and  from  there  the  God  Who  spoke 
to  him  as  he  followed  the  plough,  called  him  to 
pass  ** through  the  gates  into  the  city."  Such 
a  life  was  that  of  the  late  Governor  Mount,  of  In- 
diana, upon  whose  tomb  may  well  be  written, —  , 
* '  He  led  me  forth  also  into  a  large  place. ' '  ^y 

That  is  what  God  wants  to  do  for  all  of  us.  We 
cannot  be  so  ambitious  for  ourselves  as  He  is  for// 
us.  Not  that  He  makes  all  His  servants  leaders 
in  the  state,  but  He  makes  us  princes  of  a  royal 
line,  companions  of  apostles,  comrades  of  the 
saints,  followers  in  the  kingly  train  of  the  con- 
quering Christ. 


XII 

THE  SAVING  FEW 


"He  who  lives  in  the  faith  of  Jesus  Christ  lives  in  the 
freest  action  of  his  mental  powers,  and  sees  before  him  and 
makes  himself  a  part  of  the  large  world  into  which  man 
shall  enter,  in  which  he  has  perfect  liberty,  and  can  exercise 
his  powers  as  he  could  never  have  exercised  them  with- 
out. .  .  .  It  is  the  truth  that  is  to  make  us  free,  and 
the  entrance  of  a  man  into  that  freedom  is  the  largest  free- 
dom of  every  region  of  man's  life." 

(^Thought    and    Action.     Phillips    Brooks.) 

« 

"Life  is  a  mission.  Every  other  definition  is  false,  and 
I  leads  all  who  accept  it  astray.  Religion,  science,  philosophy, 
'though  still  at  variance  upon  many  points,  all  agree  in  this, 
that  every  existence  is  an  aim." 

(.Life   and    Writings.     Mazzini.) 

•*^       "We  live  by  Admiration,  Hope  and  Love; 

And,  even  as  these  are  well  and  wisely  fixed, 
In  dignity  of  being  we  ascend." 
iThe    Excursion.     Wordsworth.) 


XII 


THE    SAVING    FEW 


"And  there  went  with  him  a  band  of  men,  whose  hearts 
God  had  touched."     I  Sam.  x.  26. 

The  early  history  of  Israel  is  full  of  peculiar 
interest.  It  is  the  record  of  the  evolution  of  a 
people  in  the  art  of  government.  So  long  as  a 
race  is  in  its  childhood,  it  is  capable  of  no  gov- 
ernment, the  objects  of  government, — the  protec- 
tion of  life  and  property, — being  secured  by  the 
action  of  the  primal  elements  of  force  and  fear. 
But  as  the  race  rises  in  power,  as  its  interests  be- 
come more  complex,  some  form  of  organized  gov- 
ernment becomes  necessary,  and  usually  it  is  a 
very  simple  form,  government  by  tribes  or  clans. 
Each  tribe  has  its  head,  each  clan  its  chief,  and  the 
nation  is  simply  an  aggregation  of  little  govern- 
ments. 

As  time  goes  on,  the  people  of  a  given  terri- 
tory suffer  from  the  aggression  of  an  alien  race, 
and  then,  for  purposes  of  protection,  the  tribes 
federate  and  some  one  man  of  superior  ability 
comes  forward  to  lead  them  all.  In  the  hour  of 
victory  over  the  army  of  the  enemy,  some  one  cries 
out,  ''Let  us  crown  the  man  who  led  us  to  battle, 
and  make  him  chief  over  all." 

135 


136  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

It  is  done,  time  goes  by,  the  federation  is 
cemented  more  and  more  closely,  until  there  is 
something  very  like  a  kingdom,  or  an  empire  on  a 
small  scale.  So  the  first  of  the  Caesars  rose  to 
prominence.  So  have  almost  all  the  great  founders 
of  nations  risen  to  power. 

There  was  a  time  when  Israel,  for  four  hundred 
years  without  a  king,  clamored  for  a  different 
form  of  government.  For  four  hundred  years 
Israel  had  been  peculiarly  under  the  guidance  of 
the  King  of  kings.  In  times  of  danger,  deliverance 
had  come  through  some  such  providentially  de- 
veloped leader  as  Samson  or  Gideon  or  Deborah. 
Doubtless  God  would  have  been  still  the  Great 
Defender,  for  God  is  never  without  some  human 
agent  to  accomplish  His  will  among  men.  In  one 
age  He  chooses  Cyrus,  in  another  Charles  Martel, 
in  another  Gustavus  Adolphus,  in  another  William 
of  Orange,  in  another  Oliver  Cromwell,  and  in 
.  another  Washington.  God  always  has  timber 
I  growing  in  His  forest  wherewith  to  make  a  ves- 
sel's keel  or  form  a  battering  ram. 

Now  that  Israel  demands  a  king,  God  gives  them 
one,  and  his  name  is  Saul.  The  method  of  his 
choosing  is  here  related.  They  are  wise  in  trusting 
to  a  man  of  vision  and  prayer  the  selection  of  their 
monarch.  They  have  great  faith  in  Samuel's  wis- 
dom, for  he  has  shown  himself  a  faithful  prophet 
and  a  fearless  judge.  So,  to  Samuel  they  looked 
for  direction  in  matters  of  statecraft.  The  world 
has  changed  in  many  ways  since  the  day  when 
Israel    committed   the   electorate    to    Samuel.     In 


THE   SAVING   FEW  137 

many  ways  the  world  has  improved,  but  in  this 
respect  we  might  make  better  progress  by  going 
backward  and  making  the  choice  of  our  rulers  a 
religious  act.  Do  not  understand  me  to  advocate 
a  suffrage  limited  by  ecclesiastical  standards.  I 
would  not  commit  to  the  priesthood  the  authority 
to  crown  and  uncrown  kings,  to  appoint  magis- 
trates and  dismiss  them.  But  it  has  come  to  pass 
in  these  days  that  the  powers  which  select  and 
elect  the  agents  of  civil  government  have  seldom 
any  conception  of  the  sacredness  of  their  function 
in  public  affairs.  Too  often  caucuses  and  prima- 
ries are  in  the  hands  of  irresponsible  men.  There 
are,  indeed,  exceptions;  the  scholar  and  the  gen- 
tleman, the  man  of  culture  and  character  are  be- 
ginning to  see  that  the  fault  is  theirs  if  incapable 
and  corrupt  men  are  elevated  to  office. 

I  fancy  some  critic  is  saying,  ''The  choice  of 
Saul  was  an  unfortunate  one,  even  though  it  was 
directed  by  a  prophet."  So  it  may  seem.  Saul 
miserably  failed,  and  his  sun  went  dowTi  in  dark- 
ness. But  remember,  the  Eye  that  sees  all  and 
the  Mind  that  knows  all  saw  and  knew  Saul,  and 
He  said,  *'Saul  is  the  man."  And  he  was  an 
unspoiled,  valiant,  and  devout  man,  a  born  leader, 
the  very  man,  and  the  only  man  who  could  hold 
the  forming  nation  in  his  hand.  If  Saul  failed,  if 
he  made  shipwreck  of  his  life,  if,  as  has  been  sug- 
gested, the  cares  of  state  weighed  so  heavily  upon 
him  that  he  fell  a  prey  to  melancholia  bordering 
on  madness,  charge  it  not  to  Samuel,  charge  it  not 
to  God.     His  was  the  failure  of  a  strong  but  wilful 


^ 


138  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

man,  who  started  right,  but  went  astray.  And  if 
Saul  failed  to  do  all  he  should  have  done,  if  he  dis- 
appointed Samuel,  and  disappointed  God,  sinking 
at  last  into  the  grave  of  irresolute  and  vanquished 
greatness,  charge  it  not  to  the  lack  of  good  coimsel, 
for  it  is  written,  ''There  went  with  him  a  hand  of 
men,  whose  hearts  God  had  touched." 

All  that  these  words  mean,  we  cannot  say,  but 
we  may  be  sure  of  this, — they  mean  that  Samuel's 
companions  and  counsellors  at  that  time  were 
patriots,  sincere  lovers  of  Israel,  loyal  friends, 
capable  of  strong  attachment  to  each  other  and  to 
their  king;  they  were  devout  men  who  looked  to 
God  for  guidance  and  for  grace;  and  they  were 
heroes.  What  a  band  of  men  they  must  have 
been !  Not  great  men,  it  may  be,  and  not  saints, 
but  good  men,  strong  men,  brave  men,  men  of  con- 
viction and  action.  They  were  not  many,  only  a 
little  band,  but  the  future  of  Saul  depended  upon 
his  fidelity  to  them,  and  the  hope  of  Israel  was  in 
the  increase  of  their  influence  and  their  kind. 

Blessed  is  the  man  who,  when  dark  days  come, 
has  beside  him  a  little  band  of  men  whose  hearts 
God  has  touched.  David  had  such  a  band  to  sup- 
port him,  as  had  also  Elijah.  Blessed  is  the  na- 
tion which,  in  a  crisis,  in  the  presence  of  foes 
without  or  within,  when  the  mob,  unthinking  as  the 
swine  of  Gadara,  is  ready  to  rush  down  a  steep 
place  into  the  sea,  has  a  little  band  of  men  whose 
hearts  God  has  touched.  Their  common  sense  will 
hold  the  rest  in  awe.  Their  courage  will  defeat 
the  conspiracies  of  the  enemy.     Their  faith  will 


THE    SAVING   FEW  139 

pierce  the  dark  veil  of  the  future,  and  speak  of 
glorious  things  to  come.  A  little  band  of  God- 
touched  hearts  has  been  the  sweetening  leaven  of 
society,  the  saving  salt  of  the  earth,  the  radiating 
light  of  the  world.  . 

If  we  remember  this,  it  will  help  us  to  read\ 
history, — the  human  saviours  of  the  race  have  al- 
ways been  a  little  band  of  men.  How  many  were 
there  in  Gideon's  band  when  the  Midianites 
threatened  the  overthrow  of  Israel?  Not  half  a 
modern  regiment !  They  were  only  a  handful  of 
heroes  who  held  the  mountain  pass  against  the 
host  of  Persians.  And  this  is  true  of  moral  move- 
ments as  well.  The  first  disciples  of  Our  Lord 
were  only  twelve.  The  Church,  on  the  morning 
of  the  day  of  Pentecost,  numbered  but  a  hundred 
and  a  score.  When  the  Dark  Ages  came,  suc- 
ceeded by  the  Middle  Ages,  in  which  the  night 
grew  gray  with  dawn,  the  hope  of  the  pure  Gospel 
was  preserved  in  the  breasts  of  a  few  whose  knees 
would  honor  and  whose  tongues  would  confess  no 
other  name  but  Christ  as  the  Church's  head. 

Count  over  the  names  of  the  reformers,  Savon- 
arola, Huss,  Wyclif,  Zwinglius,  Sir  Thomas  More, 
Erasmus,  Melancthon,  and  Luther, — and  who  are 
they  ?  A  little  band  of  men  whose  hearts  God  had 
touched.  God  touched  their  hearts,  and  some 
spoke,  and  some  wrote,  and  some  translated,  and 
all  labored  for  the  inalienable  spiritual  rights  of 
men  and  the  glory  of  God. 

In, the  early  years  of  the  eighteenth  century,  in 
an  English  university  there  were  a  few  students 


140  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

whose  hearts  God  had  touched  to  hunger  for  holi- 
ness. They  were  from  the  humble  walks  of  life, 
not  a  prince  or  duke  or  lord  among  them.  At  first 
they  were  but  three.  Presently  the  three  grew  to 
five,  and  the  five  to  seventeen.  They  were  spoken  of 
contemptuously  as  the  Holy  Club,  Bible  Moths,  the 
Godly  Club,  Supererogation  Men.  Sometimes  they 
were  dignified  with  the  name  Enthusiasts  and  Re- 
formers, but  the  name  by  which  they  will  be  best 
remembered  is  Methodists. 

A  hundred  years  ago,  in  "Williams  College,  there 
was  a  little  band  of  men  whose  hearts  God  had 
touched.  They  met  in  the  friendly  shelter  of  a  hay- 
stack, and  held  a  prayer  meeting,  in  which  they 
consecrated  themselves  to  the  work  of  evangelizing 
the  heathen  world.  There  were  five  in  that  band, 
but  out  of  it  grew  a  similar  band  at  Andover,  in 
which  was  Adoniram  Judson,  the  great  apostle 
to  Burma.  One  of  them  died  on  the  coast  of  Af- 
rica. Two  of  them  died  of  cholera,  and  their  heroic 
dust  mingles  with  the  soil  of  India.  Another  also 
died  near  where  the  Pearl  Mosque  glistens  in  the 
sunshine  of  Agra.  Judson  was  buried  at  sea. 
Great  names  are  these, — Mills,  Hall,  Newell,  Rich- 
ards, Judson. 

In  1854  there  met  in  a  dingy  room  in  London  a 
little  band  of  men  whose  hearts  God  had  touched. 
They  were  clerks  and  tradesmen,  and  they  knew  the 
barren  life  of  clerks  in  London  stores.  So  they  or- 
ganized a  society  for  moral  and  religious  improve- 
ment, which  later  developed  into  the  Young  Men's 
Christian  Association.     I  happened  to  be  present 


THE   SAVING   FEW  141 

when  Sir  George  Williams,  the  leader  of  that  little 
band,  was  knighted,  and  no  worthier  life  has  thus 
been  honored  within  the  memory  of  man. 

About  thirty  years  ago,  in  Kumamoto,  Japan,  in 
a  boy's  high  school,  there  was  a  lad  whose  heart 
God  had  touched.  He  had  found  in  Christ  what  he 
had  not  found  in  Buddha, — a  living  Saviour.  At 
first  he  was  afraid  to  confess  his  faith,  but  one  day 
he  confided  his  secret  to  a  fellow-student,  and  his 
heart  leaped  for  joy  when  he  found  a  sympathetic 
response.  Their  joy  overflowed,  and  touched  the 
lives  of  others.  Inquirers  increased,  and  the  num- 
ber of  Christians  multiplied  until  there  were  forty 
in  that  school ;  when  they  made  public  their  confes- 
sion, it  resulted  in  the  breaking  up  of  the  school, 
but  the  dispersion  of  the  young  disciples  only  dis- 
seminated more  widely  the  new  faith,  and  some  of 
that  little  band  are  among  the  leaders  of  the  Chris- 
tian Church  in  Japan  to-day. 

Some  such  band  of  God-touched  hearts  is  at  the 
genesis  of  every  important  moral  and  religious  re- 
form of  the  ages.  The  unit  of  power  in  every  case 
is  a  single  life,  a  single  heart  touched  to  see  the 
world  as  the  subject  of  redemption.  The  single  life 
at  Oxford  was  Wesley,  at  Williams  College  was 
Samuel  Mills,  at  London  was  George  Williams,  at 
Kumamoto  a  lad  who  had  heard  of  the  New  Testa- 
ment as  containing  the  secret  of  the  beautiful  life. 
The  history  of  every  significant  movement  having 
for  its  purpose  the  uplift  of  the  race  must  be  re- 
corded thus:  *'God  touched  the  heart  of  one  man; 
he    attracted   to    him    a    second,    and    they   drew 


142  COLLEGE    SERMONS 

around  them  others,  and  so  the  holy  fire  burned  and 
the  sacred  influence  spread  from  heart  to  heart." 
A  very  suggestive  saying  is  this,  *  *  whose  hearts  God 
had  touched."  It  means  He  had  touched  the  key 
of  all  motive,  determination  and  conduct;  touched 
their  lips  to  speak,  their  minds  to  think,  their  wills 
to  act ;  touched  their  eyes,  giving  them  new  power 
to  see  things  in  their  right  relations,  new  correla- 
tions, and  a  new  unity;  touched  their  hands, 
strengthening  them  to  war  a  good  warfare ;  touched 
their  feet,  armoring  them  to  walk  strange  and  hard 
highways  of  duty.  When  God  touches  a  man's 
heart,  He  makes  a  new  man  of  him;  gives  him  no 
new  faculties,  but  turns  all  the  old  ones  to  new  use. 
He  gives  him  new  light  on  life 's  problems,  new  hope 
for  himself  and  for  the  race,  new  life  moving  in 
larger  circles  around  an  eternal  and  immovable  cen- 
ter, that  center  the  very  personality  of  Jesus  Christ. 
I  have  a  friend  who  sometimes  tells,  in  speaking 
of  the  missionary  movement,  in  which  our  progress 
sometimes  seems  so  slow,  of  a  conversation  he  once 
had  with  an  English  gardener  on  a  great  estate. 
My  friend  saw  a  strange,  uncomely  plant,  upon 
which  the  gardener  seemed  to  bestow  extraordinary 
care.  **What  is  it?"  he  inquired.  The  gardener 
answered,  **It  is  a  century  plant.  My  father  cared 
for  it  forty  years ;  I  have  cared  for  it  almost  as  long, 
and  my.  son,  who  is  my  assistant,  will  care  for  it 
after  I  am  gone.  My  father  never  saw  it  bloom, 
and  I  shall  never  see  it  bloom,  but  my 
children  and  my  children's  children  shall 
see  it  bloom,  and  then  they  will  think  of  my  father 


THE   SAVING  FEW  143 

and  of  me/'  Have  you  ever  thought  of  the  King- 
dom of  God  as  something  like  that?  It  is  a  great 
plant  having  its  root  in  the  soil  of  ages,  watered  by 
the  tears  of  the  saints,  enriched  by  the  blood  of  the 
martyrs,  fostered  by  the  care  of  apostles,  and  still 
putting  forth  strong  stalks  and  green  leaves.  The 
blossom  is  yet  to  come.  But  when  Christianity 
blossoms,  not  the  perfume  of  the  Rose  of  Sharon  or 
of  the  Lily  of  the  Valley  shall  be  so  sweet,  and  the 
glory  of  it  shall  be  shared  by  all  whose  hearts  God 
ever  touched  to  give  their  love  and  their  labor  to 
its  cultivation. 


XIII 
SUCCESS  AND  FAILURE 


(' 

If 


"I  cannot  express  it  more  nobly  than  in  good  old  Pro- 
fessor Simpson's  words  as  a  year  ago  be  laid  down  his  chair 
in  the  medical  school  of  the  University  of  Edinburgh  and 
the  deanship  of  the  medical  faculty,  and  presented  the  grad- 
uating class  of  the  year  for  their  degrees.  'It  may  chance,' 
said  he,  'that  some  July  day  far  down  the  century,  when  I 
have  long  been  m  the  ether,  one  or  other  of  you  will  talk 
with  child  or  grandchild  of  the  years  when  the  century 
was  young.  Along  its  unforgotten  scenes  there  will  arise 
before  your  mind  the  memory  of  the  day  when  at  last  you 
burst  the  chrysalis  shell  of  pupilage  to  lift  free  wings  into 
the  azure.  You  will  recall  the  unusual  concurrence  of  the 
simultaneous  leave-taking  of  the  university,  by  the  graduates 
and  their  promoter.  "We  came  away,"  you  will  say  to  the 
child,  "a  goodly  company  all  together  through  the  gateway 
that  leads  to  the  rosy  dawn.  He  passed  out  all  alone 
through  the  door  that  looks  to  the  sunset  and  the  evening 
star.  He  was  an  old  man  like  me,"  I  forebear  you  say,  '*not 
in  himself  a  great  man.  He  had  been  the  friend  of  great 
men  and  came  out  of  a  great  time  in  the  nineteenth  century 
when  there  was  mid-sea  and  the  mighty  things,  and  it  looked 
to  the  men  of  his  generation  as  if  old  things  had  passed 
away  and  a  new  world  begun.  And  he  told  us  that  the 
great  lesson  he  had  learned  on  his  way  through  life  was  the 
same  that  the  disciple  who  leaned  on  Jesus'  breast  at  supper 
taught  to  the  fathers,  the  young  men,  and  the  little  children 
of  his  time,  when  he  said,  'The  world  passeth  away,  and  the 
lust  thereof :  but  he  that  doeth  the  will  of  God  abideth  for 
ever.'  "  '  " 

{The  Marks  of  a  Man.     Robert  Elliott  Speer.     p.   US.) 


XIII 

SUCCESS   AND  FAILURE 

"This  book  of  the  law  shall  not  depart  out  of  thy  mouth ; 
but  thou  shalt  meditate  therein  day  and  night,  that  thou 
mayest  observe  to  do  according  to  all  that  is  written  therein  : 
for  then  thou  shalt  make  thy  way  prosperous,  and  then  thou 
shalt  have  good  success."     Josh.  i.  8. 

The  world  needs  a  revised  terminology.  There 
is  such  a  thing  as  the  immoral  use  of  words.  One 
of  the  signs  of  a  degenerate  age  is  the  degeneration 
of  its  vocabulary.  It  is  as  great  an  offense  to 
truth  to  apply  a  good  name  to  a  bad  thing  as  to 
apply  a  bad  name  to  a  good  thing.  In  one  of  the 
visions  of  Isaiah,  he  sees  the  redeemed  world,  the 
golden  age,  and  marks  as  one  of  its  great  features, 
a  corrected  nomenclature.  "The  vile  person  shall 
be  no  more  called  liberal,  nor  the  churl  said  to  be 
bountiful."  Is  it  not  easy  to  see  that  to  call  one 
liberal  who  is  not  liberal  is  to  wrong  all  truly  lib- 
eral souls,  and  to  call  one  bountiful  who  is  not 
bountiful,  is  unjust  to  all  truly  bountiful  souls? 
Is  it  not  an  offense  to  all  brave  men  to  call 
a  coward  brave?  Do  we  not  ruinously  discount 
gentleness  when  we  apply  the  term  to  one  who 
is  not  a  gentleman?  "What  an  offense  to  friend- 
ship to  speak  of  one  as  a  friend  who  is  merely 
an  acquaintance!     Some  one  asked  another,   ''Is 

147 


148  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

not  such  and  such  a  person  beautiful?"  and 
the  reply  was,  *'No,  not  beautiful,  but  pretty." 
A  vast  difference  between  those  words.  A  strutting 
little  officer  once  said  to  Napoleon,  **I  am  higher 
than  you,"  and  he  replied,  ** Taller,  not  higher." 

Euskin  speaks  of  the  discriminating  use  of  words 
as  one  of  the  tests  of  culture.  Surely  it  should  be 
a  quality  of  the  religious  mind  to  call  things  by 
their  right  names,  to  avoid  giving  a  good  name  to  a 
bad  act  or  a  bad  name  to  a  good  act.  The  Scrip- 
tures warn  us :  *  *  Woe  unto  them  that  call  evil  good, 
and  good  evil;  that  put  darkness  for  light,  and 
light  for  darkness;  that  put  bitter  for  sweet,  and 
sweet  for  bitter ! " 

There  is  a  word  which  occurs  with  great  fre- 
quency in  all  our  ordinary  conversation  and  read- 
ing, concerning  which  there  is  much  confusion. 
It  is  often  applied  to  people  and  things  that  do  not 
deserve  it,  and  as  often  denied  to  people  and  things 
that  do  deserve  it.  It  is  the  word  ** success,"  a 
great  word  as  to  the  place  it  occupies  in  modern 
thought.  It  has  been  called  "the  modern  god. 
Success,"  as  if  it  were  a  thing  adored  by  some, 
idolized,  deified;  as  indeed  it  is.  There  are  those 
who  regard  it  as  the  highest  good,  the  worthiest 
aim  in  life.  There  are  those  to  whom  the  inexcus- 
able offense  is  to  fail.  And  it  is,  if  we  rightly  de- 
fine the  word.  To  succeed  is  the  summum  honunif 
if  we  do  not  misunderstand  the  word.  Just  here  is 
the  trouble.  There  is  confusion  as  to  the  real  mean- 
ing of  success  and  failure.  We  overlook  a  fact  inti- 
mated in  this  text,  in  the  apparent  tautology  of  the 


SUCCESS   AND   FAILURE  149 

phrase,  *'good  success. '^  It  would  appear  that 
success  is  not  always  successful,  and  that  failure 
does  not  always  fail.  "We  have  been  deceived  by 
that  popular  sophism,  *' Nothing  succeeds  like  suc-\ 
cess/'  Who  first  uttered  that  fallacy  we  have 
never  taken  the  trouble  to  inquire.  Certainly  no 
wise  man  ever  said  it.  Certainly  no  good  man  ever 
said  it.  And  if  he  who  invented  the  saying  was 
neither  wise  nor  good,  the  sooner  we  forget  it  the 
better, — the  better  for  us,  and  the  better  for  the 
world.  The  plain  truth  is  that  nothing  succeeds 
like  what  the  world  sometimes  brands  a  failure; 
and  nothing  fails  so  miserably,  so  totally,  so  fatally, 
as  what  the  world  sometimes  calls  success.  The 
confusion  arises  from  a  double  standard  of  success. 
According  to  human  judgment,  they  succeed  who 
reach  the  end  at  which  they  aim.  The  rich  mer- 
chant, the  popular  politician,  the  promoted  cap- 
tain, the  famous  orator,  the  victorious  athlete, — 
these  succeed,  for  they  lay  hold  on  the  prize  toward 
which  they  strove.  "Whether  the  prize  is  worth 
striving  for  is  •  quite  another  consideration. 
Whether  the  gold  was  hot  and  heavy;  whether  the 
crown  was  tarnished;  whether  the  wreath  faded  on 
the  brow  of  the  victor, — such  questions  we  do  not 
ask.  What  if  the  merchant  builds  his  palace  at  the 
expense  of  his  soul?  What  if  the  politician  pur- 
chases his  power  by  judicious  silence  ?  What  if  the 
captain  ascends  the  throne  of  power  over  the  ruin 
of  hundreds  of  his  peers?  What  if  the  orator 
lowers  the  tone  of  his  gospel  to  tickle  the  itching 
ears  of  the  curbstone  mob  ?    What  if  the  runner  or 


150  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

wrestler,  in  his  development  of  the  animal,  ignores 
the  spiritual  ?  All  this  is  nothing, — they  have  suc- 
ceeded ! 

But  wait.  There  is  the  other  standard,  judged 
by  which  they  alone  succeed  who  have  a  worthy 
'aim.  In  the  one  case  the  action  is  judged  by  refer- 
ence to  the  end;  in  the  other,  by  reference  to  the 
purpose,  the  motive,  the  aspiration.  Surely  this  is 
a  safe  proposition:  Anything  succeeds  in  so  far 
as  it  does  what  it  was  designed  by  its  maker  to  do. 
An  axe  is  a  success  if  it  cuts.  A  clock  is  a  success 
if  it  keeps  time.  If  the  axe  is  not  well  tempered, 
if  it  loses  its  edge  with  the  first  stroke,  it  fails  as 
an  axe.  It  may  yet  be  a  good  hammer,  or,  sepa- 
rated from  its  handle,  it  may  serve  as  a  paper 
weight,  but  it  is  a  poor  axe.  And  if  the  clock 
cannot  be  regulated ;  if  it  is  unreliable ;  if  we  can- 
not trust  it  to  tell  us  the  hour  and  the  minute, 
however  beautiful  it  may  be  as  an  ornament,  it  has 
failed  as  a  clock. 

Let  us  apply  this  proposition  to  human  life. 
What  is  life  for?  What  did  God  intend  to  make 
when  man  walked  out  from  His  finished  thought? 
The  question  is  not.  Can  we  acquire  wealth?  We 
can  if  we  will  to  do  it.  The  question  is  not,  Can 
we  reach  the  summit  of  yonder  hill?  We  can  if 
we  will  to  do  it.  The  question  is.  What  did  the 
Creative  Power  put  us  here  to  do  ?  That  is  for  us 
to  discover,  and  that  is  for  us  to  do.  If  He  wants 
us  to  be  builders,  we  will  build.  If  He  wants  us 
to  spin,  we  will  spin.  If  God  wants  us  to  weave, 
we  will  weave.     The  bee  will  teach  us  to  build,  the 


SUCCESS  AND   FAILURE  151 

spider  to  spin,  the  worm  to  weave.  If  God  wants 
us  to  be  mere  machines,  we  will  reduce  our  lives  to 
mechanical  forces.  But,  if  He  wants  us  to  make 
the  utmost  of  our  highest  faculties,  to  cultivate  pa- 
tience, and  courage,  and  self-denial,  and  reverence,  * 
and  love,  we  must  do  that.  And  if  we  undertake 
to  do  that,  we  shall  find  our  teacher  in  a  Man  Who 
lived  a  perfect  life,  and  Whose  life  has  been  re- 
corded for  us  that  we  might  not  fail  to  make  our 
lives  Divine. 

The  Holy  Scriptures  make  plain  the  purpose  of 
man's  creation.     We  are  not  left  in  ignorance  as 
to  our  Maker's  design.     We  are  to  do  His  will,  to. 
incarnate   His  spirit,   to   follow  Jesus   Christ,   to  ^ 
have  the  mind  that  was  in  Christ, — that  is,  to  get 
His  view  of  things.  His  view  of  time  and  eternity, 
of  pleasure  and  duty,  of  failure  and  success.     If 
we  do  this,  if  we  faithfully  try  to  do  this,  we  suc- 
ceed.    If  we  do  not  try  to  do  this,  we  fail.     We 
may  succeed  as  builders,  spinners,  weavers,  ma- 
chines, and  fail  as  souls,  as  sons  of  God.     This  is 
the  Biblical  idea,  this  the  Divine  standard  of  judg- 
ment:    *'That  thou  mayest  observe  to  do  according 
to  all  that  is  written  therein."    But  how  difficult 
to  adopt  this  view !     How  many  standards  of  judg- . 
ment  are  set  up  in  opposition  to  it !     The  popular  ' 
notion  of  success  in  China  is  scholarship ;  in  India,  I 
voluntary  suffering;  in  Korea,  extreme  old  age;  in/ 
Egypt,  it  is  honorable  to  be  a  beggar;  in  Turkey, 
success  means  a  well-filled  harem;  in  Spain,  he  is 
fortunate  who  has  a  name  for  valor.     In  America, 
our  idea  of  success  is  composite.    Whatever  else  it 


152  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

excludes,  it  does  not  exclude  money  and  the  power 
money  is  supposed  to  secure  its  possessor;  it  does 
not  exclude  lavish  expenditure,  social  prestige,  the 
ability  to  impress  our  neighbors  with  our  superior- 
ity by  the  maintenance  of  an  elaborate  establish- 
ment. How  largely  money  enters  into  our  stand- 
ard of  success  is  evident  from  such  stock  phrases 
as  ''poor  but  respectable, '*  "poor  but  honest,"  ''the 
short  and  simple  annals  of  the  poor."  Is  it  not 
time  to  revise  this  part  of  our  social  creed?  Is 
there  not  some  reason  to  accustom  ourselves  to 
phrases  of  another  kind,  such  as,  ' '  rich  but  respect- 
able," "born  of  rich  but  honest  parents"?  We 
must  not  forget  that  the  annals  of  the  poor  are 
neither  short  nor  simple,  but  contain  both  names 
and  deeds  without  which  humanity  would  be  poor 
indeed. 

Whatever  standard  of  success  we  adopt,  it  were 
well  for  us  to  remember  this,  that,  measured  by  the 
worldly  standard,  most  men  fall  short  of  success. 
Great  wealth  can  be  attained  by  comparatively  few. 
Only  a  small  percentage  of  all  who  engage  in  com- 
merce achieve  distinguished  success.  The  average 
is  not  high.  In  the  nature  of  the  case,  very  few 
reach  the  highest  honors  in  politics,  and  the  exalta- 
tion of  one  means  the  humiliation  of  another.  In 
war,  one  man  is  remembered,  and  a  million  are  for- 
gotten. He  was  a  man  of  world-wide  fame,  who, 
J  having  reached  the  zenith  of  his  ambition,  wrote, 
"  I  am  on  the  height,  but  it  is  cold  and  lonely  here. ' ' 
He  had  been  a  President  of  this  Kepublic — had  re- 
tired but  two  days  before,  who  sat  in  the  house  of  a 


SUCCESS  AND   FAILURE  153 

friend  in  Washington,  and  said,  *'Two  days  ago  I 
had  many  friends ;  to-day  I  have  but  few.  I  am  no- 
body.    So  fades  the  dream !'* 

Moreover,  not  only  do  few  succeed,  judged  by 
purely  human  standards,  but  some  of  those  who 
do  succeed,  fail  in  the  highest  sense.  There  are 
vanquished  victors,  self-defeated  conquerors. 
There  are  poor  rich  men,  weak  strong  men,  foolish 
wise  men.  Whatever  else  one  may  gain,  there  are 
some  things  which,  if  he  loses,  render  him  unfortu- 
nate indeed.  Let  a  man  gain  all  the  world  has  for 
him, — power,  fame,  money,  what  is  it  all  worth  to 
him  if  he  has  lost  brightness  of  honor,  ease  of  con- 
science, treasures  of  love,  dignity  of  self-respect, 
the  dominion  of  the  spirit,  and  the  approval  of 
God  ?  I  do  not  say  that  all  who  have  gained  those 
things  have  lost  these,  but  some  have. 

On  the  other  hand,  there  are  those  who  have  been 
accounted  failures  who,  in  the  light  of  clearer  judg- 
ment, have  succeeded.  There  is  the  possibility  that 
what  looks  like  failure  now  may  succeed  in  time. 
Fifty  years  ago,  the  world  looked  at  John  Brown  \ 
and  called  him  a  failure.  But  he  did  all  that  he 
started  out  to  do,  and  more.  It  was  no  mere 
caprice  of  circumstance,  it  was  one  of  the  vindica- 
tions of  history,  that  the  song  our  soldiers  sang,  as 
they  entered  Richmond  at  the  end  of  the  w^ar,  was 

"John  Brown's  body  lies  moldering  in  the  grave, 
But  his  soul  goes  marching  on." 

William  Tyndale's  life  looked  like  a  failure, — ex- 
iled from  England,  strangled  to  death  at  Vilvorden, 


N 


154  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

praying  with  his  last  breath,  ' '  Lord,  open  the  King 
of  England's  eyes.''  But  Tyndale's  prayer  was 
answered.  Only  a  little  later  Henry  VIII  defied 
the  Pope,  and  Tyndale  's  version  of  the  Bible  passed 
on  its  way  to  the  throne  of  power.  There  was  a 
I  time  when  the  life  and  ministry  of  Jesus  .of  Naz- 
areth looked  like  a  failure.  He  had  come  to  the 
end,  with  the  religious  authorities  against  Him,  and 
with  Imperial  Eome  against  Him.  Penniless  as 
any  pauper,  homeless  as  any  outcast,  friendless, 
save  for  the  faltering  friendship  of  a  group  of  men 
as  poor  as  himself,  He  died  a  malefactor's  death  be- 
tween two  thieves.  So  ends  His  ministry !  So  van- 
ishes His  vision  of  a  kingdom!  Ends?  Vanishes? 
"Wait.  "Wait  until  the  third  day.  There  is  an  open 
tomb  in  Joseph's  garden,  and  hope  revives  in  the 
hearts  of  the  humble,  and  Jesus  Christ  begins  His 
age-long  and  world-wide  victory.  So,  what  ap- 
pears failure  may  be  success. 

There  is  always  the  possibility  that  defeat  may 
be  the  stepping-stone  to  victory.  If  failure  re- 
veals to  us  our  weakness,  and  leads  to  firm  resolve ; 
if  defeat  humiliates  us,  and  gives  us  a  better  con- 
ception of  our  proper  place,  cures  us  of  conceit ;  if 
the  wreck  of  cherished  hopes  impels  us  to  build 
statelier  mansions  for  our  souls,  then  this  may  be 

I  the  way  to  ultimate  strength  and  power.  Phillips 
Brooks  failed  as  a  teacher  in  the  Boys'  Latin  School 
in  Boston,  and  retired  from  the  profession  of  teach- 
ing, under  a  shadow,  his  heart  heavy,  his  future 
dark.  Then  he  was  led  into  the  ministry,  and  the 
world  has  reason  to  rejoice  that  he  failed  as  a 


SUCCESS   AND   FAILURE  155 

schoolmaster.  Dr.  Lorenz,  who,  by  a  process  of  j 
bloodless  surgery,  reduces  congenital  dislocation  of 
the  hip-joint,  was  a  poor  boy,  but  he  had  a  good 
mother  and  a  great  ambition.  One  day  he  found 
a  glove  on  the  street.  His  mother  said,  **My  boy,Yj 
you  will  have  to  work  hard  to  get  the  other  glove. ' '  / 
He  did  work  hard,  and  before  he  was  forty,  he  was 
Assistant  Professor  of  Surgery  in  the  University  of 
Vienna.  There  was  soon  to  be  a  vacancy  in  the 
professorship,  and  he  had  reason  to  expect  the  ap- 
pointment. Suddenly  he  developed  a  stubborn 
skin  disease.  His  hands  became  so  sensitive  he 
could  not  put  them  into  even  the  weakest  aseptic  so- 
lution. His  surgical  career  was  at  an  end.  ''The 
other  glove"  seemed  unattainable.  He  left  Vienna 
temporarily,  disconsolate,  a  failure.  But  in  Italy 
he  met  a  friend  who  suggested  that  he  specialize  in  i 
dry  surgery.  He  had  not  seriously  thought  of  that 
before.  It  opened  a  new  career  before  him,  and 
students  of  medicine  who  hear  me  well  know  what 
a  splendid  career  it  has  been.  He  had  to  fail  before 
he  began  to  succeed.- 

There  is  a  still  more  comforting  phase  of  this  sub- 
ject. There  are  those  out  of  whose  failure  there 
issues  no  such  happy  sequel  as  that  to  which  I  have 
just  adverted.  There  are  those  who  never  get  ''the 
other  glove."  There  is  this  comfort  for  them. 
Emerson  says,  "The  essence  of  greatness  is  the  per- 
ception that  virtue  is  enough."  If  this  be  true, — 
and  it  is  true — then  the  essence  of  success  is  the  per- 
ception that  to  deserve  to  succeed  is  to  succeed  in 
the  eyes  of  the  Great  Taskmaster.     Take  the  case  of 


156  COLLEGE   SEEMONS 

two  students  who  compete  for  an  honor  in  a  college 
class.  One  of  them  is  brilliant  and  quick  to  learn. 
He  acquires  knowledge  without  laborious  effort. 
The  other  is  solid,  slow  in  his  mental  processes,  ac- 
quires knowledge  painfully.  He  must  work  hard 
to  do  what  the  other  does  with  ease.  At  the  end  of 
the  term,  the  brilliant  student  is  awarded  the  prize. 
Has  the  other  failed?  Far  from  it.  The  in- 
structor knows  that  the  prize-winner  is  not  the  close 
student.  If  the  prize  represents  application,  in- 
dustry, studious  habits,  then  the  loser  deserves  it. 
But,  after  all,  the  reward  of  scholarship  is  not  a 
gold  medal,  or  an  honorable  mention.  Scholarship 
is  its  own  reward. 

No  earthly  court  or  committee  is  competent  to 
say  in  any  case  whether  the  successful  man  de- 
serves to  succeed.  There  are  so  many  factors  of 
which  we  have  no  knowledge.  Doubtless,  the  real 
victor  is  often  the  apparently  defeated  contestant. 
Doubtless,  there  are  those  whom  we  call  moral 
failures  who  have  struggled  more  heroically  for 
victory  over  self  and  sin  than  some  others  who 
are  called  saints.  The  poet  is  right  who  inti- 
mates that  there  may  be  more  reverence  in  some 
people's  honest  doubts  than  in  some  other  peo- 
ple's thoughtless  prayers.  We  fall  back  for- 
ever upon  this  assurance,  *'The  Lord  knoweth 
them  that  are  His. ' '  He  knows  how  fierce  has  been 
the  battle,  and  how  faithful  the  spirit  of  the  man 
who  fails.  He  knows  the  fidelity  of  His  servants 
who  fight  unseen  battles,  and  perhaps  never  taste 
the  sweets  of  victory.     He  knows  the  struggle  of  the 


SUCCESS   AND   FAILUKE  157 

conquered,  and  forever  and  forever  He  holds  out 
His  hand  to  the  soul  in  the  midst  of  stress  and 
storm,  saying,  * '  Be  thou  faithful  unto  death,  and  1 
will  give  thee  a  crown  of  life/' 

It  is  the  faithful,  not  the  clever;  the  faithful, 
not  the  brilliant;  the  faithful,  not  the  successful, 
who  succeed.  We  are  not  commanded  to  keep  up 
with  the  procession.  We  are  commanded  not  to 
depart  from  ''this  book  of  the  law."  We  are 
commanded  to  "meditate  therein  day  and  night." 
We  are  commanded  to  keep  step  with  our  Leader, 
— and  when  the  march  is  long  and  the  load  heavy 
He  tarries  for  us.  There  was  one,  long  ago, 
who  said  at  the  close  of  his  long  and  burdened  life, 
the  end  of  which,  apparently,  was  an  unrelieved 
tragedy,  "I  have  fought  a  good  fight  ...  I 
have  kept  the  faith."  That  is  what  changes  the 
whole  case.  Paul 's  life  was  not  a  tragedy.  It  was 
an  epic,  magnificent  and  beautiful.  No  man  who 
fights  a  good  fight  ever  fails.  No  man  who  keeps 
the  faith  throws  his  life  away.  Earth  may  take 
that  life  and  break  it,  but  God  takes  up  the  frag- 
ments, and  lo!  in  His  hands  they  are  a  perfect 
whole. 


XIY 
NOT  BY  BREAD  ALONE 


*'Surely  this  is  a  mystery.  But  just  as  surely  it  is  a 
reality.  Inwardly,  men  and  women  are  being  renewed  day 
by  day,  while  outwardly,  men  and  women  are  perishing. 
Souls  are  being  bom  again  continually,  not  by  the  will  of 
the  flesh  nor  by  the  will  of  man,  but  by  the  Word  of  the 
Lord,  which  liveth  and  abideth  for  ever — which  Word  is 
Christ.  Men  are  living  by  bread,  but  not  by  bread  alone. 
Underneath  the  bounties  which  supply  their  temporal  needs 
they  are  touching  the  hand  which  feeds  their  spiritual  long- 
ings. In  the  wilderness  they  are  finding  heavenly  manna. 
Living  waters  flow  from  the  riven  rocks  of  time  and  sense. 
Through  the  withering  and  fading  leaves  of  mortality,  as  in 
a  secret  and  perpetual  springtide,  their  souls  are  pierced 
and  quickened  with 

"  'Bright   shoots   of  everlastingness.' 

"Of  this  life  Christ  is  the  giver  and  the  source  Christ  is 
the  Bread  of  God  Which  cometh  down  from  heaven  and  giv- 
eth  life  unto  the  world.  Christ  is  the  living  vine,  and  through 
Him  flows  every  drop  of  immortality  that  renews  the  human 
branches  and  makes  them  glad  with  blossoms  and  fertile  in 
everlasting  fruits." 

{The  Open  Door.     Henry  Van  Dyke.     p.   154.) 


XIV 

NOT   BY   BREAD   ALONE 

"It  is  written,  Man  shall  not  live  by  bread  alone." 
Matt.    iv.   4. 

We  should  never  read  the  fourth  chapter  of 
]\Iatthew  without  reading,  in  connection  with  it, 
the  fourth  chapter  of  Hebrews.  Matthew  records 
the  threefold  temptation  of  Jesus.  The  author  of 
the  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews  declares,  **We  have  a 
High  Priest  Who  is  touched  with  the  feeling  of  our 
infirmities  and  was  in  all  points  tempted  as  we 
are."  I  have  heard  a  student  say,  ** Jesus  was 
never  tempted  as  I  am."  I  have  heard  a  business 
man  say,  ''Jesus  was  never  tempted  as  I  am."  I 
have  heard  an  artist  say,  "Jesus  was  never  tempted 
as  I  am. ' '  But  He  was,  He  was  tempted  as  all  of  us 
are  tempted,  since  He  was  tempted  in  all  points. 
His  temptations  were  thoroughly  representative. 
His  first  temptation  was  to  the  appetite,  the  senses ; 
his  second  was  to  the  intellect,  an  appeal  to  the 
pride;  His  third,  was  to  the  will,  an  appeal  to  the 
desire  for  power,  ambition,  that  "last  infirmity  of 
noble  minds."  So  the  three  temptations  covered 
the  whole  scope  of  life,  the  entire  compass  of  char- 
acter. "In  aU  points."  Where  are  the  student's 
temptations?     In   the   realm   of   intellect?    Jesus 

161 


162  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

was  tempted  there.  "Where  are  the  business  man's 
temptations?  In  the  realm  of  will?  He  was 
tempted  there.  Where  are  the  artist's  tempta- 
tions? In  the  realm  of  sensibility?  He  was 
tempted  there.  In  this,  as  in  every  other  respect 
essential  to  humanity,  Jesus  is  the  representative 
Man,  the  second  Adam  of  a  new-born,  nobler  race. 
Abraham  Lincoln  is  universally  beloved  in  mem- 
ory because  he  had  within  him,  in  larger  measure 
than  any  other  man  of  modern  times,  the  things 
that  are  common  to  us  all.  This  is  a  paradox, — 
that  the  very  commonness  of  the  man  is  the  thing 
that  makes  him  uncommon !  Can  a  man  be  so  like 
us  all  that  he  is  above  us  all?  Yes.  And  that  is 
one  feature  of  the  unique  distinctiveness  of  Jesus. 
He  lived  a  life  so  full  of  toil  and  trial,  so  full  of 
knowledge  and  experience,  that  though  He  is 
bound  to  us  all  as  our  universal  Brother,  yet  He  is 
*'the  Sovereign  Seer  of  Time."  A  modern  poet 
sings ; 

"Although  I  know  Thee  as  the  Son  of  God 
Anointed, 
And  hail  Thee  Prophet,  Priest,  and  King 

Appointed, 
Still  when  I  need  Thee,  Thou  art  nearest, 
And  when  I  trust  Thee,  Thou  art  dearest, 
As  Son  of  Man. 

"And  so   I  call  Thee  by  the  title 

That  I  love. 
And  by  the  name  that  speaks  most  comfort 

From  above ; 
Redeemer,  Counsellor,  Immanuel, — 
As  these  I  know  Thee  not  so  well 

As  Son  of  Man." 


NOT   BY   BREAD   ALONE  163 

But  not  the  character  of  His  temptation  inter- 
ests us  as  does  the  method  of  His  conquest.  * '  It  is 
written,"  He  says.  In  the  knowledge  of  what  has 
been  written,  He  has  wherewith  to  answer  His  ad- 
versary. And  in  the  knowledge  of  what  has  been 
written  we  have  a  source  of  strength  the  extent 
and  value  of  which  is  often  unsuspected. 

Matthew  Arnold  defines  culture  as  the  knowl- 
edge of  the  best  that  has  been  thought  and  said  in 
the  world.  That  knowledge  is  preserved  in  books : 
the  jurisprudence  of  Hammurabi  and  of  Moses,  of 
Lycurgus  and  Justinian;  the  poetry  of  Isaiah  and 
Homer,  of  Virgil  and  Dante,  of  Burns  and  Brown- 
ing; the  dramas  of  ^schylus  and  Shakspere;  the 
meditations  of  Marcus  Aurelius  and  Epictetus; 
the  intimate  journals  of  Pascal  and  Amiel ;  the  vis- 
ions of  *' Piers  Plowman"  and  John  Bunyan;  the 
orations  of  Demosthenes  and  Cicero,  of  Burke  and 
Webster;  the  civic  idealism  of  Plato  and  Sir 
Thomas  More,  of  John  Locke  and  Adam  Smith; 
the  gentle  humor  of  Charles  Lamb;  the  scholarly 
£estheticism  of  Ruskin;  the  aesthetic  democracy  of 
William  Morris;  the  sermons  of  Robert  Hall  and 
John  Wesley.  The  greatest  thoughts  of  the 
world's  greatest  thinkers  are  on  these  library 
shelves.  To  know  what  is  written  is  culture,  and 
culture  is  a  large  part  of  what  the  old  •  Greek  ^ 
philosopher  called  "ampleness  of  soul."  Better  a  ' 
little  house  with  an  ample  soul  than  an  ample 
house  with  no  horizon.  The  Arab,  it  is  said, 
will  not  destroy  the  least  floating  fragment  of 
print  lest  it  contain  the  Divine  name  or  a  sentence 


164  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

from  one  of  the  sacred  books.  What  is  written  is 
holy  in  his  sight. 

What  is  the  Bible?  It  is  the  record  of  God's 
revelation  to  His  children.  It  is  the  laboratory 
notebook  of  the  greatest  religious  geniuses  the  hu- 
man race  has  thus  far  produced.  History,  bi- 
ography, philosophy,  ethics,  poetry,  literature,  these 
are  all  here.  For  what  ?  For  whom  ?  *  *  These 
are  written,  that  te  might  believe  .  .  .  and 
that  believing  ye  might  have  life  through  His 
name."  I  stood  beside  a  critic  in  an  art  gallery 
recently,  and  heard  him  say  of  a  canvas,  ''That 
picture  is  not  true  to  life."  Similarly  we  charac- 
terize certain  novels,  and  condemn  them,  as  not 
true  to  life.  Here  are  two  pictures.  One  is  a  pho- 
tograph, and  the  other  a  painting.  Superficially, 
the  photograph  is  true  to  life.  It  was  made  by 
machinery.  A  lens,  unconscious  and  insentient, 
took  in  the  view  of  things  just  as  they  were  at  the 
moment  the  shutter  snapped.  But  the  painter  sat 
and  waited  till  a  cloud  obscured  the  sun,  or  till  a 
mist  hung  over  the  valley,  and  he  caught  the  sub- 
dued glow  in  the  sky,  the  color  of  the  rocks,  the 
very  atmosphere  of  the  place,  the  peace  that  over- 
spread it  like  the  smile  of  God.  He  painted  him- 
self in  it;  he  put  his  own  mood  into  it,  and  so  he 
was  true  to  the  life  within.  This  illustrates  the 
difference  between  the  mechanical  view  of  the  uni- 
verse and  the  spiritual  view.  ''Man  shall  not  live 
by  bread  alone." 

By  what  does  man  live  if  not  by  bread?  "By 
every  word  that  proceedeth  out  of  the  mouth  of 


NOT    BY    BREAD   ALONE  165 

God."  Jesus  here  quotes  from  the  Book  of  Deu- 
teronomy, in  which  God  speaks  to  Moses,  and  Moses 
to  the  people  shortly  before  his  death.  How  have 
they  lived  these  forty  years  in  the  wilderness? 
Their  hunger  has  been  fed,  and  their  thirst  has 
been  assuaged,  but  they  have  had  a  life  which  has 
been  nourished  by  other  things  than  by  manna 
from  heaven  and  water  from  the  smitten  rock.  Je- 
hovah said  to  them,  "Remember  all  the  way  you 
have  been  led."  Then  they  remembered  Egypt, 
her  slime  pits  and  brick  kilns;  Egypt,  and  the 
tombs  of  her  tyrant  kings  and  the  temples  of  her 
beast-worship;  Egypt,  and  the  Nile  running  red 
like  a  bleeding  vein  laid  open  on  the  bare  brown 
breast  of  the  desert;  Egypt,  and  sudden  darkness; 
Egypt,  and  the  death  angel  marking  with  his 
shadow  the  threshold  of  every  home  from  palace  to 
hut;  Egypt,  and  the  sprinkled  blood  of  the  pass- 
over;  Egypt,  and  the  Exodus,  the  crossing  of  the 
sea,  the  mountain  and  its  law ;  Marah  and  its  sweet- 
ening branch  in  the  bitter  pool;  Meribah  and  the 
gushing  flood;  Elim  and  its  palms;  the  brazen 
serpent;  the  death  of  Aaron  on  Mount  Hor, — all 
this  they  remembered  and  knew  that  their  God  had 
trained,  subdued,  controlled,  organized,  and  com- 
pacted them  into  a  nation.  They  had  come  out  of 
Egypt  an  ungoverned  mob ;  they  are  slowly  taking 
the  shape  of  a  self-governing  people.  In  the  coun- 
cil of  the  elders  there  is  the  germ  of  future  par- 
liaments and  senates.  In  their  code  of  laws  there 
is  the  germ  of  future  constitutions  and  statutes. 
They  are  learning  to  live  by  memory.     History  is 


166  COLLEGE   SEPtMONS 

♦  only  the  recorded  memory  of  past  events.  It  is  not 
too  much  to  say  that  we  lea^-n  to  live  by  history. 
We  shape  our  future  by  the  lessons  of  experience. 

•*  The  voice  of  the  past  is  the  voice  of  the  Eternal, 
warning,  entreating,  admonishing,  encouraging, 
summoning  us  to  ''the  trimmed  lamp  ^nd  the 
girded  loin."  Is  not  this  the  message  of  Isaiah, — 
''Thine  ears  shall  hear  a  word  behind  thee,  saying. 
This  is  the  way,  walk  ye  in  it,  when  ye  turn  to  the 
right  hand,  and  when  ye  turn  to  the  left ' '  ? 

If  we  live  by  memory,  if  we  learn  from  history, 
as  we  do,  still  more  do  we  live  and  learn  by  our 
own  deepest  experiences.  Hezekiah  puts  it  into 
words  of  beauty  and  power,  when,  after  his  re- 
covery from  illness,  and  the  merciful  lengthening 
of  his  life,  he  prays,  ' '  O  Lord,  by  these  things  men 
live,  and  in  all  these  things  is  the  life  of  my  spirit. ' ' 
By  what  things?  What  has  secured  the  renewal 
of  his  spiritual  life  ?  The  lengthening  of  his  years 
was  but  a  little  thing.  The  deepening  of  his  life 
was  everything;  He  had  been  face  to  face  with 
death,  and  he  was  not  afraid,  for  he  had  walked  be- 
fore the  Lord,  "in  truth  and  with  a  perfect  heart." 
But  he  was  ashamed  to  die.  He  had  not  finished 
his  work.  Sennacherib's  army  had  been  snuffed 
out  like  a  candle,  and  Jerusalem  had  peace.  But 
after  peace-bells  ring  there  are  perils  more  subtle 
and  more  deadly  than  alien  armies.  After  Ap- 
pomattox came  Reconstruction,  and  the  shame  is 
on  us  yet.  Hezekiah  had  yet  a  man's  work  to  do, 
and  his  sun  was  going  down  at  noon.     His  prayer 


NOT   BY   BREAD   ALONE  167 

was  not  the  frenzied  cry  of  an  epicure,  loath  to 
leave  his  purple  and  his  banquet  table,  but  of  a 
hero  who  wants  to  be  in  the  battle  for  God  in  the 
thick  of  the  fight. 

I  know  a  man  who  occupies  a  great  pulpit  in  the 
West  who,  ten  years  ago,  stood  where  Hezekiah 
stood,  at  what  seemed  his  journey's  end.  The 
shadow  on  the  dial  moved  back  for  this  modern 
prophet,  and  when  he  next  stood  before  the  people, 
he  said :  '  *  I  have  had  my  vision  of  Christ.  Others 
may  have  clearer  vision  of  Him,  but  this  is  mine.  ^ 
I  will  preach  only  what  I  know.  I  will  preach 
only  what  I  know  is  supremely  important.  I  will 
preach  only  what  I  have  fallen  down  upon  and 
found  safe  and  able  to  bear  me  up.  I  will  preach 
only  what  I  found  true  when  lately  I  went  up  to 
the  gate  of  Otherwhere.'*  Ah,  it  is  by  such  things 
men  live.  It  is  by  such  things  life  takes  on  new 
and  Divine  significance. 

The  greatest  specialist  in  pulmonary  tuberculo-  ■ 
sis  in  America  is  himself  a  sufferer  from  the  dis- 
ease he  has  done. so  much  to  conquer  in  others. 
Two  of  his  children  have  died  from  it.  I  saw  him 
once  after  he  had  sat  for  hours  in  his  consulting 
room,  examining  patients.  He  was  weary.  He 
said:  "I  have  just  seen  a  girl  who  was  sure  she 
was  incurably  sick,  and  there  is  nothing  the  mat-  i  (^  ' 
ter  with  her.  I  had  to  tell  another  who  was  sure 
she  had  only  'a  trifling  cold'  that  she  is  doomed 
to  die."  Then,  shuddering,  and  with  tears  in  his 
eyes^  he  leaned  his  head  on  his  desk,  and  cried, 


168  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

*'0  God!  0  God!"  That  man  will  come  down 
from  the  mountains  for  a  few  days,  to  meet  people 
fwho  cannot  go  to  him,  or  to  speak  before  medical 
societies,  and  tuberculosis  congresses,  and  then 
hurry  back  with  shortened  breath,  the  unvanishing 
shadow  ever  at  his  side.  Unconquerable  of  will 
and  tender  of  heart,  it  is  by  such  things  he  lives, 
■ — by  suffering,  and  courage,  and  sympathy.  But 
hear  him  speak  of  the  world-wide  campaign  of  ed- 
ucation in  the  prevention  of  disease,  and  you  will 
see  he  lives  also  by  hope. 

It  was  in  April,  1865.  Grant  was  drawing  his 
lines  about  Lee  to  hold  him  in  relentless  grasp. 
Grant  was  ill.  He  had  eaten  nothing  for  hours, 
and  little  for  days.  His  face  was  ashen,  his  fea- 
tures pinched,  and  he  looked  like  an  old  man. 
Then  there  approached  his  headquarters  a  Con- 
federate officer,  on  horseback,  and  under  escort,  and 
handed  him  a  note  from  Lee  indicating  willingness 
to  surrender.  One  of  Grant's  staff  said,  ^'I  never 
saw  such  a  transformation.  The  general's  eyes 
took  on  brightness,  and  color  came  to  his  cheeks. 
He  sent  Lee  his  answer,  and  walked  away  with  the 
buoyancy  of  a  youth."  Hope  had  given  him  new 
life.  An  Apostle  says,  ''We  are  saved  by  hope." 
That  is  because  hope  is  only  another  aspect  of 
faith.  Hope  is  faith  foreseeing  the  keeping  of 
God's  "Word.  It  is  faith  leaning  on  God's  Word. 
It  is  faith  trusting  in  the  dark.  We  do  not  say 
too  much  when  we  say  that  it  is  by  faith  we  live. 
''The  just  shall  live  by  faith."  Faiths  may  per- 
ish, but  faith  does  not. 


NOT   BY   BREAD   ALONE  169 

I, 
"There  is  no  unbelief;  \ 

Whoever  plants  a  seed   beneath   the  sod, 

And  waits  to  see  it  push  away  tJae  clod, 

He  trusts  in  God. 

"Whoever  says,    'The   clouds   are   in   the  sky, 
Be  patient,  heart,   light  breaketh  by  and  by,' 
Trusts  the  Most  High. 

"Whoever  sees,  'neath  winter's  wealth  of  snow, 
The  silent  harvest  of  the  future  grow, 
God's  power  must  know. 

"Whoever  says,   'To-morrow,'  'The  Unknown,* 
'The  Future,'  trusts  the  Power  alone 
He  dares  disown." 

In  Jesus'  mind,  life  had  a  double  meaning.  In 
His  speech,  bread  had  a  double  meaning.  *'My 
meat  is  to  do  the  will  of  Him  that  sent  Me."  *'I 
have  meat  to  eat  that  ye  know  not  of."  It  is  not 
difficult  to  judge  where  the  Apostle  John  learned 
the  lesson  of  ** hidden  manna"  which  they  must 
feed  upon  who  overcome.  Material  bread  feeds 
the  material  body,  but  there  is  another  body,  an- 
other life.  To  awaken  us  to  the  reality  of  that 
other  life  was  the  mission  of  the  Master  among 
men.  ' '  It  is  not  that  which  entereth  into  the  body 
that  defileth  it. ' '  Our  lives  are  like  temples  slowly 
building  through  the  days.  Our  bodies  are  the 
scaffolding.  It  matters  little  what  composes  the 
scaffolding,  just  so  it  holds  together  till  the  temple 
is  built.  "What  goes  into-  the  construction  of  the 
temple  is  of  infinite  importance.  Its  materials 
must  be  abiding.  It  demands  strength  and  beauty. 
There  are  pillars  and  ''lily  work"  at  the  top.     We 


170  COLLEGE   SEKMONS 

live  by  the  things  that  build  us  up  invisibly, — by 
memory  and  hope;  by  experience  and  aspiration; 
by  prayer  and  faith;  by  worship  and  service;  by 
every  word  that  proceedeth  out  of  the  mouth  of 
God;  thus  and  only  thus  are  we  ''builded  together 
for  an  habitation  of  God  through  the  Spirit. ' ' 

"Said  the  corn  to  the  lilies, 
'Come  not  near  my  feet, — 
You   are   only   lilies, 
Neither  corn  nor  wheat ; 
Can  one  earn  a  living 
Just  by  being  sweet?' 

"Answered  the  lilies 
Neither  Yea  nor  Nay, 
But  they  looked  the  fairer 
All  the  livelong  day, 
And,  at  length,  the  Master 
Chanced  to  come  that  way. 

"While  the  tired  disciples 
Waited  at  His  feet. 
And  the  proud  corn  rustled, 
Bidding  them  to  eat, 
'Children,'  said  the  Master, 
\*The  Life  is  more  than  meat 


»  » 


XV 

THE  PRACTICAL  VALUE  OF  SENTIMENT 


"It  is  pleasant  to  feel  nobly — that  is  to  say,  to  live  above 
the  lowlands  of  vulgarity.  Manufacturing  Americanism  and 
Caesarian  Democracy  tend  equally  to  the  multiplying  of 
crowds,  governed  by  the  appetite,  applauding  charlatanism, 
bowing  to  the  worship  of  Mammon  and  of  pleasure,  and 
adoring  no  other  God  than  force.  What  poor  samples  of 
mankind  they  are  who  make  up  this  growing  majority !  Oh, 
let  us  remain  faithful  to  the  altars  of  the  ideal !  .  .  . 
Materialistic  naturalism  has  the  wind  in  its  sails,  and  a  gen- 
eral moral  deterioration  is  preparing.  No  matter,  so  long  as 
the  salt  does  not  lose  its  savor,  and  so  long  as  the  friends  of 
the  higher  life  maintain  the  sacred  fire.  The  wood  itself  may 
choke  the  flame,  but  if  the  flame  persists,  the  fire  will  only 
be  the  more  splendid  in  the  end." 

"The  ideal,  after  all,  is  truer  than  the  real :  for  the  ideal 
is  the  eternal  element  in  perishable  things :  it  is  their  type, 
their  sum,  their  raison  d'etre,  their  formula  in  the  Book  of 
the  Creator,  and  therefore  at  once  the  most  exact  and  the 
most  condensed  expression  of  them." 

{Amiel's  Journal.  [Mrs.  Humphrey  Ward's  Translation.]  Vol.  I. 
pp.  227,  228,  234.) 


XV 

T'HE  PRACTICAL   VALUE   OF   SENTIMENT 

"And  they  said  one  to  another,  Behold,  this  dreamer  cometh." 
Gen.   xxxvii.    19. 

Hans  Christian  Andersen's  story,  *^The  Ugly 
Duckling,"  is  a  classic.  The  Ugly  Duckling  was 
no  duckling  at  all,  but  a  swan,  and  in  the  eyes  of 
the  ducklings,  an  awkward,  unlovely,  unfriendly 
bird.  Not  until  the  swans  came  did  the  ugly  duck- 
ling take  its  proper  place  and  claim  its  heritage  of 
beauty  and  of  grace. 

Joseph  was  the  ugly  duckling  of  Jacob's  brood. 
He  was  not  like  his  brothers.  They  were  rude, 
gross,  savage.  He  was  gentle,  sentimental,  poetic. 
They  were  herdsmen,  hunters,  fighters,  tillers  of 
the  soil,  men  of  affairs.  He  was  a  dreamer,  a  mys- 
tic. It  is  not  strange  he  was  an  alien  and  stranger 
to  them.  It  is  not  strange  they  were  hostile  to  him. 
It  was  the  antipathy  of  opposites. 

His  fellow-citizens  hated  Aristides  because  he 
was  just  and  they  were  not.  Joseph's  brethren 
hated  him  because  he  was  their  dissimilar,  their 
superior,  and  because,  being  what  he  was,  he  was 
his  father's  favorite.  Jealousy  was  at  the  root  of 
their  hatred.     He  had  committed  the  unpardon- 

173 


174  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

able  sin  in  their  eyes, — the  deadly  and  unpardon- 
able sin  of  being  unlike  them. 

Jealousy  is  at  the  root  of  a  great  many  kinds  of 
hatred, — race  hatred,  and  class  hatred.  The  poor 
unbalanced  brain  that  accomplished  the  assassina- 
tion of  President  IMcKinley  was  conscious  only  of 
an  unreasoning  class  jealousy.  He  said,  ''I  did 
not  think  it  was  right  that  one  man  should  have 
so  much  service,"  meaning  honor,  I  presume.  Jo- 
seph's brethren  did  not  think  it  right  that  he 
should  have  the  preeminence.  The  coat  of  bril- 
liant colors  was  nothing  in  itself,  but  whenever 
they  saw  it,  it  seemed  to  speak  of  all  the  favorit- 
ism with  which  their  superior  brother  had  been 
treated.  **  Superior?"  Had  they  not  equally 
good  claims  to  honor  ?  "Were  they  not  also  Jacob 's 
sons  ?  Did  they  not  labor  for  the  common  welfare 
of  the  family  and  clan?  So,  doubtless,  they 
thought,  and  so,  doubtless,  they  talked,  and  the 
poison  of  jealousy  rankled  in  their  hearts  until 
they  were  ready  for  any  crime  in  the  calendar. 
Do  we  not  know  how  many  a  life  has  been  blasted, 
and  how  many  a  household  has  been  ruined,  by 
that  unlovely  thing,  jealousy?  Given  jealousy, 
and  many  things  may  follow, — self-love,  cruelty, 
violence,  death.  But,  though  the  end  may  not 
be  violence,  the  end  is  always  misery  and  tears. 

In  the  case  of  Joseph's  brethren,  there  was  not 
only  contempt  for  the  dissimilar,  but  contempt  for 
the  familiar.  Many  a  genius,  many  a  sage,  many 
a  saint,  has  been  despised  by  those  who  were 
nearest  to  him.    It  is  the  old  story  of  the  un- 


THE    PRACTICAL    VALUE    OF    SENTIMENT       175 

honored  prophet  in  his  own  land.  We  have  all 
heard  of  "the  illusion  of  the  near."  Are  we  not 
prone  to  the  undervaluation  of  the  near?  At  the 
unveiling  of  a  monument  to  a  great  literary  man, 
some  one  remarked  to  his  widow,  who  was  present, 
''You  must  feel  very  proud  to  have  been  the  wife 
of  such  a  man."  She  replied,  "Yes,  I  am,  but 
there  were  times  when  he  was  a  dreadful  nuisance 
about  the  house!"  That  is  nothing  less  than  the 
tragedy  of  the  familiar. 

The  words  of  the  brothers  as  the  lad  Joseph 
approaches,  ''Behold,  here  comes  this  dreamer," 
suggest  to  me  a  far  more  general  thought  than 
personal  hatred  or  jealousy.  They  suggest  the^ 
scorn  of  a  practical  world  for  the  merely  senti- 
mental. It  may  not  amount  to  scorn.  It  may  be 
mere  neglect,  but  the  mental  attitude  is  that  which 
says  of  the  artist,  the  nature-lover,  the  poet,  the 
mystic,  "Here  comes  that  dreamer."  Popular  in-' 
difference  to  art  is  one  of  the  outward  signs  of  a 
lack  of  inward  grace.  There  are  not  wanting 
some  signs  that  we,-  in  America,  are  awakening  to 
a  sense  of  our  needs  in  this  direction,  but  the 
lamentable  ignorance  of  the  average  man  as  to  the 
standards  of  value  in  art  condemns  us  for  our  de- 
ficiency in  the  recognition  of  the  value  of  senti- 
ment. It  does  make  a  difference  whether  a  church 
looks  like  a  temple  or  a  warehouse.  It  does  make 
a  difference  whether  our  homes  are  beautiful  or 
hideous.  It  does  make  a  difference  whether  we 
cover,  our  walls  with  gaudy  chromos  and  showy 
crayons,  or  with  artistic  engravings,  photographs 


176  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

of  the  masters,  (which,  by  the  way  are  no  more 
expensive  than  the  colors  that  shriek  at  us).  It 
does  make  a  difference  whether  the  streets  of  a 
city  are  disfigured  by  glaring  advertisements  and 
indecent  theatrical  posters.  Blessed  are  the  civic 
improvement  agitators.  *'Here  comes  that 
dreamer,"  but  the  life  of  the  city  is  sweeter  and 
saner  and  finer  because  he  has  lived  in  it,  and  gen- 
erations yet  to  come  will  rise  up  to  honor  his 
name. 

Disregard  of  the  ideal  phases  of  nature  is  a 
part  of  this  contempt  for  the  sentimental.  The 
modern  world  owes  a  great  debt  to  John  Ruskin 
for  calling  our  attention  not  alone  to  the  genuine 
in  art,  but  to  the  sublime  in  nature.  Eead  his 
prose  poem  on  *' Clouds,"  and  then  go  out  under 
the  sunset  skies  and  see  the  handiwork  of  the  In- 
finite Artist  on  the  immeasurable  canvas  of  the 
heavens. 

The  Christian  Church  observes  the  Sacrament  of 
the  Lord's  Supper  with  this  in  view, —  to  make 
God  real  to  us,  to  give  us  a  sense  of  His  intimate 
nearness.  Any  symbol,  any  experience  that  gives 
us  a  sense  of  the  Divine  Presence,  is  sacramental. 
The  study  of  Nature  in  some  of  her  phases  has 
that  effect  on  some  souls.  There  is  a  beautiful 
suggestion  of  this  in  Shakspere's  *' Merchant  of 
Venice."     Lorenzo  says  to  Jessica: 

"Look   how   the   floor  of   heaven 

I  Is  thick  inlaid  with  patines  of  pure  gold  : 
There's  not  the  smallest  orb  which  thon  beholdest 
But  in  his  motion   like  an  angel  sings 
Still  choiring  to  tlie  young-eyed  cherubim." 


THE   PBACTICAL   VALUE   OF   SENTIMENT       177 

Thie  patine  is  the  cover  of  the  sacramental  cup.  Is 
there  nothing  sacramental  to  us  in  a  starry  night, 
in  a  rare  landscape,  in  a  virgin  forest  ?  If  not,  we 
have  not  learned  to  read.  What  says  the  psalm- 
ist? ''The  heavens  declare  the  glory  of  God;  and 
the  firmament  showeth  His  handywork.''  What 
John  Ruskin  has  done,  Dr.  Van  Dyke  and  Mr. 
Roberts  are  doing,  and  all  such  men  to  whom  the 
world  is  under  obligation  for  the  vision  of  many 
a  ''little  river,"  and  the  heart  of  many  an 
"ancient  wood."  We  have  never  seen  Jesus  as 
He  was  until  we  see  what  a  nature-lover  He  was, 
how  at  home  among  the  mountains  and  on  the 
sea,  what  eyes  He  had  to  behold  the  heavenly 
meaning  of  every  earthly  scene. 

Not  only  in  popular  indifference  to  art,  and 
common  disregard  of  the  ideal  phases  of  nature, 
does  this  contempt  for  the  sentimental  appear. 
At  the  worst,  it  expresses  itself  in  the  failure  of 
many  an  otherwise  sane  and  shrewd  man  to  esti- 
mate the  proper  place  of  religion  in  the  economy 
and  government  of'  life.  Ask  your  busy,  bustling, 
energetic  man  of  affairs  what  the  bank  stands  for, 
what  the  factory  stands  for,  and  he  will  tell  you. 
He  gives  these  their  proper  place  in  life.  Neither 
does  he  underestimate  the  importance  of  educa- 
tional and  benevolent  institutions.  But  if  you 
ask  him  what  the  Church  represents,  he  may  reply, 
"Nothing  but  sentiment."  It  is  the  same  old 
materialism, — "Here  comes  that  dreamer." 

Yet,  if  we  inquire  whence  have  come  the  in- 
fluences which  have  made  man's  life  and  woman's 


178  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

honor  safe;  whence  the  forces  which  have  set  a 
new  value  on  manhood,  protected  the  sanctity  of 
the  home,  endowed  us  with  the  sovereign  rights 
of  citizenship;  if  we  inquire  the  fertile  source  of 
the  movement  that  makes  for  universal  brother- 
hood and  peace,  there  is  but  one  answer.  The 
most  potent  agent  in  the  education  and  elevation 
of  society,  and  in  the  amelioration  of  human  con- 
ditions, has  been  "the  faith  of  our  fathers."  By 
all  the  dreams  of  all  the  dreamers,  by  all  the 
visions  of  all  the  prophets,  by  all  the  prayers  of 
all  the  saints,  and  by  all  the  tears  of  all  the 
martyrs,  the  world  has  been  purified  and  uplifted 
towards  God.  Jacob's  vision  of  Shiloh;  Daniel's 
vision  of  the  world  governed  in  righteousness; 
Ezekiel's  vision  of  the  river  flowing  from  the  altar 
of  the  House  of  God  throughout  the  earth ;  Paul 's 
vision  of  the  man  in  Europe  asking  for  help ; 
Peter's  vision  of  eliminated  racial  barriers,  and 
John's  vision  of  a  heavenly  city  descending  upon 
earth,  are  but  parts  of  the  perfect  vision  of  the 
plan  of  God  who  made  the  world  to  be  the  dwell- 
ing place  of  a  ransomed  race. 

No  vision  of  David,  or  Isaiah,  or  Langland,  or 
Bunyan  ever  gave  the  man  who  had  it  and  de- 
clared it  the  title  that  belongs  to  Jesus  as  the 
Supreme  Idealist  of  the  race.  A  skeptical  social- 
ist inquires,  ''But  what  did  Jesus  ever  do?" 
He  wrote  no  constitutions,  issued  no  Emancipa- 
tion Proclamations,  signed  no  Magna  Charta,  but 
He  made  it  possible  for  other  men  to  work  out 
the   freedom   of   mankind.     He   began   it   all   by 


THE   PRACTICAL   VALUE    OF    SENTIMENT       179 

emancipating  the  spirit,  by  making  us  conscious  of 
world-citizenship,  by  laying  upon  us  the  dignity 
of  God's  children.  So  doing,  He  became  the 
Supreme  Idealist  and  as  such  rules  the  world. 
But  He  chooses  to  rule  the  world  through  us. 
Standing  at  His  side,  we  have  visions  of  world-con- 
quest, not  for  ourselves  but  for  the  Kingdom  He 
founded  in  the  hearts  of  men. 

It  is  no  small  thing  to  follow  Jesus  Christ.  It 
is  to  inherit  a  world  of  sentiment,  and  a  world  of 
enterprise.  It  is  ours  not  alone  to  dream,  but  to 
dream  and  do.  Joseph  was  a  dreamer,  but  he 
rose  to  the  premiership  -of  Egypt.  Daniel  was  a 
dreamer,  but  he  became  president  of  the  princes 
of  Babylon.  History  is  full  of  instances  of  men 
who  have  inhabited  the  great  world  of  the  ideal, 
and  yet  were  not  unfitted  for  contact  with  earthly 
problems.  Michelangelo  was  not  a  mere  dreamer. 
Gladstone  was  not  a  mere  dreamer.  Some  one  says 
of  him,  ''He  possessed  two  realms,  one  sentimental, 
the  other  practical,  and  from  either  he  could  with- 
draw himself  into  the  other,  and  from  each  he 
emerged,  stronger  for  the  other."  General  "Chi- 
nese" Gordon  was  not  a  mere  dreamer.  He  had 
time  to  cultivate  sentiment,  the  noblest  of  all  senti- 
ments— friendship  with  God — and  yet  he  was  a 
warrior  and  the  ruler  of  a  great  African  empire. 

We  must,  as  workers  together  with  God,  as 
scholars  in  the  school  of  Christ,  cultivate  the  sen- 
timental in  the  midst  of  the  practical.  The  senti- 
mental is  practical.  We  must  build  our  castles  in 
the  air  before  we  know  where  to  build  them  on  the 


\ 


180  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

^  earth.  George  Washington  wrought  out  with  his 
sword  what  Samuel  Adams  had  already  wrought 
out  with  his  pen.  Garibaldi  and  Victor  Emmanuel 
were  not  the  only  liberators  of  Italy;  there  was 
Mazzini,  who  had  dreamed  of  a  free  and  unified 
Italy  before  them,  and  had  started  a  hundred  thou- 
sand young  Italians  to  dreaming  his  dream  until 
they  were  ready  to  respond  to  Garibaldi's  call, 
p  when  he  said,  ''You  that  are  in  love  with  hardship 
and  death,  follow  me. ' ' 

The  function  of  the  dreamer  is  to  hold  up  be- 
fore us  the  ideal,  to  show  us  things  as  they  should 
be.  The  scheme  may  appear  impracticable,  and 
it  may  be  so  now;  but  to-morrow  the  conditions 
may  have  changed,  and  that  which  to-day  is  im- 
possible may  become  the  common  order.  Let  us 
read  with  new  eyes  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount, 
Paul's  hymn  of  love  in  the  thirteenth  chapter  of 
his  First  Epistle  to  the  Corinthians,  Peter's  con- 
ception of  the  Christian  life  as  a  chorus,  in  which 
faith,  courage,  knowledge,  self-control,  endurance, 
godliness,  brotherly  kindness  and  love  make  melody 
unto  the  Lord,  and  see  how  Christianity  creates 
high  ideals  for  us,  gives  us  glimpses  of  the  beauti- 
ful in  conduct  and  the  sublime  in  character. 

Herbert  Spencer,  in  the  preface  to  his  ''Data 
of  Ethics,"  speaks  of  the  Christian  ideal  as  so 
difficult  as  to  be  unattainable.  That  is  the  old 
Pagan  spirit  which  charges  us  that  our  faith  is 
only  a  beautiful  dream.  Shall  we  therefore  give 
up  our  dreams?  No;  the  glory  of  our  faith  is  in 
the  perfectness  of  its  visions.     All  hope  of  indi- 


THE   PEACTICAL   VALUE   OF   SENTIMENT      181 

vidual  worth  and  social  greatness  is  in  our  honest 
effort  to  make  the  ideal  real.  The  saddest  fact 
about  our  lives  is  that  we  become  too  easily  dis- 
couraged, and,  seeing  the  difference  between  what 
we  are  and  what  Jesus  Christ  commands  us  to  be, 
we  abandon  effort,  and  treat  our  vision  as  a  com- 
mon thing.  There  is  no  tragedy  comparable  with 
this, — the  human  heart  a  deserted  sanctuary;  the 
inner  light  aflame  no  longer;  amidst  all  the  music 
of  the  spheres,  no  voice  from  heaven;  amidst  all 
the  glories  of  earth  and  sea  and  sky,  no  Divine 
vision.  The  universe  is  empty  then,  and  life  is 
vain.  *'He  who  hath  lost  God  hath  nothing  more 
to  lose, — he  hath  lost  all.  He  who  hath  gained 
God  hath  nothing  more  to  gain, — he  hath  gained 
aU.'' 


XVI 

THE  ATHENIAN  ALTAR 


"Within  the  walls  of  the  southern  city — and  Peking  con- 
sists of  three — is  a  parklike  inclosure,  three  miles  in  cir- 
cumference. Its  interior  is  occupied  by  avenues  of  forest 
trees,  tangled  woodlands,  and  open  stretches  of  coarse  grass. 
Within  several  walls,  at  the  gate  of  each  of  which  a  small 
fee  is  demanded,  in  a  silent,  lonely  space,  where  neither  the 
din  of  the  city  nor  the  cries  of  children  penetrate,  arises 
the  famous  Altar  of  Heaven,  unrivaled  by  all  altars  beside. 
It  rests  massively  on  the  broad  bosom  of  the  earth ;  bare 
to  heaven ;  solitary,  majestic,  unattended ;  a  solid  pile  of 
white  marble,  which  reminded  me  of  nothing  so  much,  for 
absolute  impressiveness,  as  Stonehenge.  Imagine  a  com- 
plete circle  of  pure  white  marble,  ninety  feet  across,  as 
though  concentric  with  the  horizon,  and  elevated  in  its  solid 
mass  some  sixty  feet  above  the  earth.  On  the  south  and 
north  its  level  surface  is  reached  by  flights  of  stately  steps, 
each  broken  into  three  terraces  of  nine,  representing  man, 
earth,  and  heaven.  On  the  occasion  of  his  annual  visit,  the 
emperor  approaches  from  a  distant  door,  alights  from  his 
chair,  walks  slowly  through  long  lines  of  state  officials, 
ascends  the  southern  stairway,  and  makes  his  way  as  a 
suppliant  to  the  central  stone,  a  perfect  circle.  He  kneels 
there  reverently  before  four  pillars  of  bronze,  on  which 
sundry  small  offerings  of  incense  and  silk  are  placed,  whilst 
a  whole  bullock  is  being  burnt  in  a  great  furnace  faced 
with  green  porcelain,  which  stands  on  the  grass  below. 
Thus  he  intercedes  for  his  land,  with  'the  Almighty  Ruler 
of  Heaven,'  as  though  he  were  another  Melchizedek. 

"We  stood  on  that  stone  with  profound  reverence.  It  is 
recorded  of  Dr.  Legge,  that,  on  reaching  this  spot,  he  was 
overcome  with  emotion,  took  off  his  boots,  because  it  seemed 
holy  ground,  and  said,  *If  ever  God  has  been  worshiped  in 
China,  He  has  been  worshiped  here.* 

"Very  few  Europeans  have  seen  that  tablet;  but  we  had 
the  pleasure  of  being  accompanied  by  Rev.  Mr.  Rhys,  of 
L.M.S.,  who  is  one  of  that  fortunate  number.  Accompanied 
by  Gilmour  of  Mongolia,  on  one  occasion  he  scaled  the  in- 
closing walls  at  an  unfrequented  part,  and  saw  that  elo- 
quent witness  of  the  unappeasable  demand  of  the  human 
heart  for  the  Living  God." 

(F.  B.  Meyer.  Letter  from  Peking,  British  Weekly,  September 
30,  1909.) 


XVI 

THE  ATHENIAN  ALTAR 

"For  as  I  passed  by,  and  beheld  your  devotions,  I  found 
an  altar  with  this  inscription,  TO  THE  UNKNOWN  GOD. 
Whom  therefore  ye  ignorantly  worship,  Him  declare  I  unto 
you."     Acts  xvii.  23. 

There  is  hardly  a  man  in  the  world,  however 
little  he  may  value  culture,  however  highly  he  may 
value  time,  who  would  not  give  the  best  year  of 
his  life  to  see  Athens, — Athens  restored,  Athens 
as  she  was  in  the  days  when  she  was  *Hhe  eye  of 
Greece,  the  mother  of  arts  and  eloquence."  The 
nearest  modern  approach  to  that  Athens  was  the 
White  City  on  the  banks  of  Lake  Michigan  in 
1893.  A  Greek  archbishop  saw  that  splendid 
creation  of  architecture  and  exclaimed,  *'This  is 
like  the  Athens  of  my  ancestors.''  Yet  it  was  not 
Athens;  it  lacked  Athenians.  What  were  Athens 
without  her  poets  and  orators,  her  artists  and 
philosophers?  At  the  Nashville  Exposition  a 
dozen  years  ago,  they  reproduced  the  Parthenon  in 
miniature,  but  it  was  not  the  Parthenon, — it 
lacked  the  atmosphere  and  spirit  of  Hellenism. 
Thucydides  said  of  Attica,  *'Her  place  in  history 
will  be  measured  by  her  capacity  to  produce  men. ' ' 
What   makes   a   city   great   and   famous   with   a 

185 


186 


COLLEGE   SERMONS 


worthy  fame?  The  people  that  inhabit  it,  the 
great  minds  that  think,  the  great  hearts  that  beat, 
in  it, — they  give  it  immortality. 
J  Charles  Lamb  once  said  he  would  have  counted 
it  high  honor  to  have  been  Shakspere's  bootblack. 
Consider  the  great  men  that  flourished  in  the  lat- 
ter half  of  the  first  century  of  our  era :  Pliny,  Sen- 
eca, Quintilian,  Juvenal, — who  of  us  would  not 
rather  see  these  than  to  see  Rome  in  all  her  glory? 
Indeed  these  were  Eome.  It  was  at  this  time  there 
flourished  another  man,  not  a  Greek,  though  ac- 
quainted with  Greek  thought ;  not  a  Roman,  though 
a  Roman  citizen ;  a  Jew,  but  not  a  Jew  in  exclusive- 
ness.  He  was  not  a  philosopher,  as  was  Seneca ;  not 
a  historian,  as  was  Pliny ;  not  a  critic,  as  was  Quin- 
tilian; not  a  poet,  as  was  Juvenal.  There  is  no 
term  which  better  describes  him  than  that  by 
which  he  calls  himself,  an  Apostle  of  Christ, 
"Paul,  called  to  be  an  Apostle."  If  we  might  be 
permitted  to  see  the  face,  clasp  the  hand,  hear  the 
voice  of  but  one  of  the  great  men  of  that  age, 
few  of  us  would  hesitate  to  choose  Paul.  In  him 
centers  all  that  is  worthiest,  all  that  most  con- 
cerns the  future  of  the  race.  He  stands  for  a  new 
philosophy  of  life,  a  new  revelation  of  truth,  a 
new  order  of  things. 

.  The  text  presents  a  picture  of  Paul  in  Athens. 
He  had  just  come  from  Berea,  where  many  had 
"received  the  word  with  all  readiness  of  mind." 
Awaiting  the  coming  of  Silas  and  Timothy,  he  oc- 
cupied his  time  looking  about  the  city.  He  could 
not  have  been  indifferent  to  its  classic  interest.    The 


THE   ATHENIAN   ALTAR  187 

golden  age  of  Athens  had  passed,  yet  there  was 
much  to  remind  him  of  the  days  of  Pericles  and 
Phidias.  Yet  he  was  not  here  as  a  sight-seer,  a 
relic-hunter,  an  antiquarian.  He  was  here  as  the 
representative  of  a  new  religion.  ''His  spirit  was 
stirred  in  him,  when  he  saw  the  city  wholly  given  to 
idolatry."  He  entered  into  conversation  with 
students  and  citizens.  He  found  them  curious  to 
know,  eager  to  hear,  about  ''this  new  doctrine."  A 
multitude  of  them  conducted  him  to  Mars  Hill, 
and  requested  a  full  statement  of  his  faith.  He 
complied  with  their  wish  and  in  sentences  of  truly 
noble  eloquence,  proclaimed  the  great  truths  of 
Christianity,  concerning  God  and  man.  He  be- 
gan: "Ye  men  of  Athens,  I  perceive  that  in  all 
things  ye  are  very  religious."  He  did  not  say, 
**Ye  are  too  superstitious."  He  was  too  great  an 
orator,  too  skillful  a  controversialist,  too  wise  a 
tactician,  to  begin  with  an  offensive  charge.  With 
prudence  taught  him  in  the  schools  of  rhetoric, 
with  discretion  exampled  by  his  Divine  Master, 
he  not  onlj^  avoided  a  danger  into  which  an  un- 
trained mind  might  have  fallen,  but  he  employed 
that  very  danger  to  draw  them  to  him.  "Too 
superstitious?"  Far  from  it,  rather,  "Ye  are 
unusually  reverent."  There  were  altars  all  about 
him,  altars  to  Jupiter,  Diana,  Apollo,  Venus, 
Ceres,  Athena,  Juno;  altars  to  graces  and  furies; 
alters  to  Fame,  to  Energy,  to  Eloquence.  Athens 
was  full  of  altars.  An  old  traveler  tells  us  there  \ 
were. more  altars  in  Athens  than  in  all  the  rest 
of  the   world.    A   Roman   satirist   said,    '*It   is 


188  COLLEGE   SEKMONS 

'easier  to  find  a  god  in  Athens  than  to  find  a 
man."  But  with  all  their  altars  and  their  gods, 
they  felt  the  need  of  something  higher  and  truer. 
They  were  groping  after  something  better  than  the 
best  they  had.  So  they  erected  an  altar  and  wrote 
upon  it,  ''TO  THE  UNKNOWN  GOD."  It  was 
a  confession  of  the  failure  of  their  faith  to  satisfy 
the  deepest  longings  of  the  soul.  So  Paul  used 
their  confession,  saying, — "Whom  therefore  ye 
ignorantly  worship.  Him  declare  I  unto  you." 
It  was  the  act  of  a  consummate  orator,  ''wise  as  a 
serpent,  yet  harmless  as  a  dove." 

There  are  men  who,  standing  where  Paul  stood, 
w^ould  have  charged  the  Athenians  boldly  with 
folly  and  unreasonableness.  The  sight  of  all 
those  altars  would  have  awakened  their  indigna- 
tion. But,  to  Paul,  the  whole  Pagan  world  was 
as  a  blind  man  groping  in  a  world  of  night,  lean- 
ing on  a  frail  reed.  He  would  not  strike  from 
their  hands  their  only  staff.  He  would  offer  them 
a  better.  He '  sought  for  some  faint  footstep  of 
the  living  God,  and  found  it  at  that  altar  to  the 
Unknown  God.  To  the  Greeks  he  became  a  Greek 
that  he  might  win  some.  His  theme  that  day  was 
"The  Unknown  God."  His  propositions  were. 
Though  God  may  be  unknowTi,  He  is  not  un- 
knowable; and.  He  has  revealed  Himself  in  Jesus 
Christ.'  Indeed,  in  some  form  or  other,  this  was 
always  Paul's  thesis, — that  it  is  possible  to  know 
God  through  Jesus  Christ.  This  is  the  message 
of  the  Gospel  to  the  M^orld  to-day, — that  we  may 
know  Him,  know  that  He  is,  know  how  near  He 


THE  ATHENIAN  ALTAE  189 

is,  know  that  we  are  in  harmony  with  Him,  know 
the  moral  impulse  of  His  spirit  and  the  inward 
uplift  of  His  everlasting  arms. 

The  battle  of  Christianity  to-day  is  not  so  much 
with  atheism,  which  denies  the  existence  of  God, 
as  with  agnosticism,  which  affirms  the  unknow- 
ability  of  God.  The  modern  Athenian  has  built 
him  an  altar,  and  inscribed  upon  it,  *'To  the  Un- 
knowable God."  The  agnostic  is  perfectly  will- 
ing to  admit  that  there  may  be  a  God,  and  that 
He  may  be,  metaphysically,  all  that  we  say  He  is ; 
but  if  He  is,  we  have  no  means  of  knowing  it; 
if  there  is  a  spiritual  world  and  a  future  life,  we 
have  no  means  of  verifying  them;  we  may  hope 
and  wish  and  dream,  but  this  is  not  knowledge. 
So  speaks  the  modern  Athenian,  and  he  seems  so 
modest  and  humble,  so  candid  and  truth-seeking, 
he  attracts  multitudes  of  disciples. 

Consider  for  a  moment  what  kind  of  a  God  ag- 
nosticism is  willing  to  admit  there  may  be, — a 
God  with  metaphysical  properties  only.  Why  not 
ascribe  to  Him  moral  qualities  as  well?  Grant 
the  existence  of  such  a  God,  One  Who  is  not  only 
eternal  but  merciful,  not  only  wise  but  compas- 
sionate, and,  by  so  much  as  He  is  compassionate, 
He  must  reveal  Himself  to  men  who  need  a 
knowledge  of  Him  more  than  they  need  anything 
else  in  the  world.  If  God  could  be  without  moral 
qualities,  we  might  never  know  Him,  but,  being 
good,  He  is  under  the  necessity  of  His  own  nature 
to  reveal  Himself  to  men.  And,  we  believe  He  does 
reveal  Himself  in  Nature,  in  the  Moral  Law,  in 


190  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

History,  in  the  Holy  Scriptures,  and  in  His  In- 
carnate Son. 

* '  The  heavens  declare  the  glory  of  God ;  and  the 
firmament  showeth  His  handywork. "  Infinite 
Wisdom,  Infinite  Power,  Infinite  Beauty, — these 
are  the  revealing  of  God  in  creation.  "A  Power 
not  ourselves  which  makes  for  righteousness," — 
so  God  speaks  to  us  from  depths  of  our  own 
being.  An  Invisible  Force,  moulding  nations, 
lifting  up  one  and  casting  down  another,  operat- 
ing now  through  Cyrus  of  Persia,  and  now  through 
Alexander  of  Macedon,  to  do  the  will  of  the  King 
of  kings, — so  God  speaks  to  us  in  history.  Then 
there  is  this  Book.  No  man  can  read  it  long  and 
seriously  without  discovering  in  it  a  Spirit  re- 
.buking  sin,  teaching  noble  reverence  for  things 
above  us,  sincere  respect  for  things  about  us, 
wholesome  fear  of  things  below  us;  a  Spirit  foster- 
ing hope,  whispering  peace,  silencing  the  lips  of 
pain,  discovering  to  us  our  own  best  gifts  and  life's 
consummate  crown.  No  man  can  read  this  Book 
carefully  and  candidly  without  discovering  in  it 
intimations  of  a  final  revelation,  a  revelation  of 
God  to  men,  by  which  those  who  are  blind  to 
nature's  message,  deaf  to  the  call  of  conscience, 
and  dead  to  the  lessons  of  history,  may  see,  must 
see,  that  God  is  a  Father  and  that  we  are  His 
children. 

The  highest  revelation  of  life  to  life  is  vital, 
not  mechanical,  not  philosophical,  not  epistolary. 
How  does  a  friend  reveal  himself  to  you?  By  his 
workmanship,  by  his  gifts,  by  correspondence,  it 


THE  ATHENIAN   ALTAR 


191 


may  be.  Then,  last  and  best,  the  friend,  the 
lover,  presents  himself,  knocks  for  admission  at 
your  heart's  door.  That  is  the  revelation  of  life 
and  love.  How  does  a  mother  reveal  herself  to 
her  child?  As  nurse,  as  protector,  as  teacher,  as 
everything  a  mother  can  be,  until  some  day  it 
dawns  upon  the  unfolding  soul  that  motherhood, 
brooding,  sacrificial  motherhood,  is  more  than  a 
mere  force;  it  is  a  life. 

So  God  reveals  Himself  to  us,  first  as  Cause,  as 
Designer,  as  Intelligence,  as  Beauty,  and  Order, 
and  Righteousness.  But,  in  the  fullness  of  time,  a 
star  glides  out  of  the  East  to-  guide  us  to  a 
Cradle.  What  is  there?  The  beginning  of  the 
revelation  of  Immortal  Life,  of  Deathless  Love,  of 
God  no  longer  unknown,  no  longer  dimly  per- 
ceived, but  the  unveiled  light  of  His  glory  in  the 
face  of  Jesus  Christ.  Hail,  Babe  of  Bethlehem! 
Hail,  Man  of  Galilee !  On  this  altar  we  will  write 
Thy  name,  and  it  shall  be  called,  **  Wonderful, 
Counsellor,  the  mighty  God,  the  everlasting 
Father,  and  the  Prince  of  Peace." 

There  are  three  distinct  types  of  men,  classified 
as  to  their  knowledge  of  God.  There  are  those 
to  whom  there  is  no  God.  They  have  shut  Him 
out  of  their  lives.  No  spiritual  message  comes  to 
them  out  of  all  the  universe.  For  them  ''the 
Great  Companion  is  dead."  And  the  explanation 
is  in  Bushnell's  well  known  phrase,  "Religious  ^) 
capacity  extirpated  by  disuse."  A  peculiar  mean- 
ing attaches  to  the  word  "fool"  in  the  psalmist's 
characterization   of   one    who   said   in    his   heart, 


192  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

A  * '  There  is  no  God. '  *  It  signifies,  ' '  empty,  faded, 
withered."  So  the  person  referred  to  is  not  a 
fool  in  the  common  sense  of  the  term,  a  thought- 
less, shallow,  unreasoning  mind.  Much  less  is  he 
an  imbecile,  incapable  of  thought.  The  world  may 
call  him  wise ;  he  may  be  a  scholar,  a  philosopher. 
But,  bright  as  his  mind  may  be,  something  has  oc- 
curred to  wither  up  the  faculties  by  which  God  is 
apprehended. 

Then  there  are  those  to  whom  God  is  unknow- 
able. Denying  the  human  possibility  of  knowl- 
edge of  the  Divine,  they  have  closed  and  barred  the 
doors  of  their  minds  to  evidences  of  His  revela- 
tion. Somewhere  in  their  lives  there  may  be  an 
altar  to  the  Unknown  God.  When  they  feel  the 
need  of  Divine  fellowship,  they  are  at  the  altar 
of  the  Unknown  God.  When  the  longing  for  im- 
mortality, *' leaps  like  an  angel  from  the  temple  of 
their  hearts"  it  is  the  soul's  cry  to  the  Unknown 
God.  When  sorrows  come,  as  sorrows  must  come 
in  a  world  where  death  swings  his  scythe  in  every 
summer  breeze  and  every  winter  blast,  and  when 
they  crave  comfort  such  as  no  earthly  power  can 
give,  they  are  reaching  out  their  hands  toward  the 
Unknown  God. 

But  there  are  others  to  whom  God  is,  to  whom 
He  is  knowable,  and  to  whom  He  is  known.  It  fell 
to  the  lot  of  Helen  Keller  to  hear  from  the  lips 
of  Phillips  Brooks  her  first  clear  message  as  to 
God.  He  made  very  plain  his  doctrine  of  God's 
personality  and  of  His  care  for  us.     She  under- 

L  stood  what  he  said,  and  replied,  *'I  knew  all  that, 


THE  ATHENIAN   ALTAR  193 

but  I  did  not  know  His  name.''  She  had  known 
Something  as  the  sum  of  all  goodness,  the  object 
of  all  devotion,  the  sky  out  of  which  and  the  sea 
into  which  the  stream  of  her  life  was  flowing. 
Her  thoughts  had  gone  out  to  Him,  and  returned 
in  ways  she  did  not  understand,  but  in  ways  that 
brought  a  strange  sense  of  peace  and  joy.  Whom, 
ignorantly  she  had  worshipped,  she  came  to  know 
as  God. 

There  is  a  realm  in  which  God  comes  near  to 
us,  and  becomes  at  once  the  most  intimate  and  the 
most  extensive  fact  in  all  our  experience.  Out  on 
the  desert  of  Arabia,  far  from  the  nation  that 
knew  God  best,  we  hear  the  voice  of  Eliphaz,  in 
the  Book  of  Job,  urging  us,  **  Acquaint  now  thyself 
with  Him,  and  be  at  peace. ' '  Again,  on  the  plains 
of  Judea,  a  Man  is  speaking  to  His  disciples  about 
God.  He  does  not  argue  that  God  is;  He  takes 
that  for  granted.  He  seems  to  be  very  sure  of 
God.  His  voice  has  the  accent  of  earnestness 
and  authority.  God  is  more  real  to  Him  than  any 
other  fact  or  force.  And  strange  to  say.  His 
conviction  of  things  unseen  is  so  contagious  that 
when  He  speaks  those  who  hear  Him  have  no 
doubt.  He  says,  ' '  This  is  life  eternal  to  know  God 
and  Jesus  Christ  Whom  He  hath  sent."  A  new 
note  in  the  music  of  the  world  is  sounded,  and  its 
melody  lifts  us  in  spirit  to  fellowship  with  Him. 
Strangest  of  all  phenomena  in  the  realm  of  re- 
ligion is  this,  that  fellowship  with  Him  pro- 
duces upon  us  exactly  the  effect  of  fellowship  with 
God.     Things  that  are  equal  to   the   same  thing 


194  COLLEGE   SERMONS 

are  equal  to  each  other.  Once  He  said,  **No  man 
knoweth  .  .  .  the  Father,  save  the  Son,"  and 
then  He  added,  ''and  he  to  whomsoever  the  Son 
shall  reveal  Him."  So,  since  Jesus  Christ  has 
come,  and  has  not  withdrawn  His  presence  from 
the  world,  the  Infinite  is  not  unlaiown,  the  Eternal 
is  not  silent,  and  Faith  is  something  more  than  a 
bridge  of  sighs  across  the  gulf  of  Time  and  Death. 

"In  Christ  I  touch  the  hand  of  God, 

From    His    pure    heights    reached   down, 

By  blessed  ways  before  untrod, 
To   lift   us   to  our  crown ; 

Victory   that   only  perfect   is 

Through    loving    sacrifice    like   His. 

"Holding   His    hand    my    steadied    feet 

May    walk    the    air,    the   seas ; 
On  life  and  death  His  smile  falls  sweet, 

Lights  up  all  mysteries ; 
Stranger  nor  exile  can   I   be 

In  new  worlds  where  Efe  leadeth  me.'* 


THE  END 


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